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THADDEUS   STEVENS 


COMMONER. 


BY 


E.  B.  CALLENDER. 

il 


BOSTON: 
A.  WILLIAMS   AND   COMPANY. 

Corner 

1882. 


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Copyright,  1882, 
By  A.  WILLIAMS  &  Co. 


BOSTON  STEREOTYPE  FOUNDRY, 
4  PEARL  STREET. 


AUTHOR'S  PREFACE. 


IT  has  been  remarked  that  republics  are  un 
grateful  to  their  servants.  The  people  forget 
the  great  services  rendered  by  those  who  have 
put  self  out  of  sight  in  their  desire  to  serve 
others.  Especially  true  is  this  in  an  age  like 
the  present — so  full  of  political  curiosity  and 
so  wanting  in  political  talent.  With  the  desire 
of  calling  attention  to  the  inestimable  value  to 
the  nation  of  the  life  of 'that  great  public  ser 
vant,  Thaddeus  Stevens,  and  the  importance  of 
his  stalwart  policy  in  securing  the  results  of  the 
war,  the  author  has  written.  The  unthinking 
endeavor  to  cast  a  stigma  on  the  word  stalwart 

o 

by  associating  it  with  the  spoils  system.  But 
it  means  more  than  that.  The  word  stands  for 
that  bold,  courageous,  and  loyal  policy  which 
will  be  the  lasting  glory  of  the  Republican 
party.  No  one  better  represented  it  than 


111 


M44747 


iv  AUTHOR'S  PREFACE. 

Thaddeus  Stevens.     We  may  call  him  "the  first 
stalwart. " 

The  author  expresses  the  hope  that  the  exam 
ination  of  the  "  great  commoner's  "  record  may 
lead  others  to  a  greater  appreciation  of  the 
Pennsylvania  statesman's  services,  and  of  the 
grand  work  accomplished  by  a  direct,  manly, 
and  stalwart  policy  in  national  affairs. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.    EARLY  LIFE  —  EDUCATION  —  PROFESSION  7 

II.    MASON  AND  ANTI-MASON        ...  18 

III.  FREE  SCHOOL  —  BUCKSHOT  WAR    .        .  31 

IV.  THE  PHILIPPICS 55 

V.    AD  INTERIM  — REPUBLICAN  PARTY  .        .  78 

VI.    HEROIC  EPOCH 100 

VII.    FOND  GAILLARD 152 

VIII.      GOES  OVER  TO  THE  MAJORITY            .           .  162 

APPENDIX. 

I.    MISSOURI  COMPROMISE     .        .        .        .169 

II.    SUMNER'S  EULOGY  200 


THADDEUS    STEVENS: 

COMMONER. 


CHAPTER  I.  .-     oi  ;    -:r. 

EARLY  LIFE.  —  EDUCATION.  —  PROFESSION. 

THE  political  world  tried  to  wake  up  about 
the  last  part  of  the  eighteenth  century.  The 
American  revolution  was  a  start  in  the  dark. 
The  French  revolution  was  a  nightmare  —  the 
world  tried  to  wake.  It  could  only  open  its 
eyes  for  a  second,  tortiously  struggle,  "swear 
a  prayer  or  two,  then  sleep  again."  Reform 
bills  in  England,  abolition  of  the  slave-trade, 
and  the  like,  were  but  twists  and  turns.  It  was 
not  till  "emancipation,"  "suffrage,"  "amnesty," 
and  reconstruction  had  supplemented  "all  men 
are  created  equal"  with  "all  men  continue 
equal,"  that  the  world  fairly  awoke.  In  that 
great  awakening  there  was  one  who  more  than 
any  other,  it  seems  to  me,  was  a  mastering  spirit 
and  genius.  When  this  nineteenth  century 
shall  be  peacefully  laid  away  (if  the  century 
that  gave  birth  to  telegraphs  and  railroads  and 


8  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

steamboats  and  sewing-machines  and  reapers 
and  the  free  ballot  and  liberty  and  equality  can 
ever  be  laid  peacefully  away),  I  doubt  if  among 
all  the  "  large-hearted  heroes  born  in  better 
years,"  the  muse  of  history  will  find  one  more 
hostile, to  Slavery,  more  devoted  to  freedom, 
more  desirous  of  happinesj  and  equality  for  all 
men  *  than  TJiaddeus  Stevens,  surnamed  the 
"  Great  Commoner."  Garrison's  fame  may  last 
longer,  but  Garrison  was  only  an  abolitionist. 
He  agitated  nothing  beyond  that.  When  1863 
brought  emancipation,  he  declared  the  work 
done.  Even  Sumner,  at  first,  merely  declared 
hostility  to  the  slave  oligarchy.  Lincoln  said, 
"  I  drift,"  and  waited  for  the  people's  voice. 
But  Stevens,  throughout  his  whole  career,  never 
had  but  one  purpose,  —  absolute  equality  for 
all  men  before  the  law. 

I  do  not  propose  a  complete  biography. 
The  time  has  not  come  for  that.  In  an  age 
when  political  impotency  is  confounded  with 
political  chastity,  it  is  useless  to  draw  the  pic 
ture  of  a  man.  But,  while  it  is  yet  day,  and 
before  the  nation  has  wholly  followed  the 
strange  gods  of  political  aestheticism  and  im 
becility,  it  is  well  to  ponder  for  a  moment  over 
the  record  of  one  who  was  a  man,  a  hero,  a 
king. 


THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

I  will  not  dwell  upon  his  ancestry.  It  was 
lowly  enough,  no  doubt.  It  had  to  be,  to  pro 
duce  so  human  and  great  a  character  as  his. 
The  nearer  to  the  earth,  the  nearer  to  the  com 
mon  parent,  endless  generator  of  all  energies. 
Like  all  men  of  genius,  Stevens  derived  his  dis 
tinguishing  characteristics  from  his  mother,  a 
woman  who  possessed  great  strength  of  mind, 
and  whose  will  was  iron.  The  story  of  his 
parents  is  best  told  by  himself.  "  I  really  think 
the  greatest  gratification  of  my  life  resulted 
from  my  ability  to  give  my  mother  a  farm  of 
two  hundred  and  fifty  acres,  and  a  dairy  of  four 
teen  cows,  and  an  occasional  bright  gold  piece, 
which  she  loved  to  deposit  in  the  contributors' 
box  of  the  Baptist  Church,  which  she  attended. 
This  always  gave  her  great  pleasure,  and  me 
much  satisfaction.  My  mother  was  a  very  ex 
traordinary  woman.  I  have  met  very  few 
women  like  her.  My  father  was  not  a  well- 
to-do  man,  and  the  support  and  education  of 
the  family  depended  on  my  mother.  She 
worked  day  and  night  to  educate  me.  I  was 
feeble  and  lame  in  youth ;  and,  as  I  could  not 
work  on  the  farm,  she  concluded  to  give  me  an 
education.  I  tried  to  repay  her  afterwards,  but 
the  debt  of  a  child  to  his  mother,  you  know,  is 
one  of  the  debts  we  can  never  pay.  Poor 


10  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

woman !  The  very  thing  I  did  to  gratify 
her  most  hastened  her  death.  She  was  very 
proud  of  her  dairy  and  fond  of  her  cows ; 
and,  one  night  going  to  look  after  them,  she 
fell  and  injured  herself,  so  that  she  died  soon 
after." 

Alexander  Hams,  in  a  r£sumd  of  the  charac 
ter  of  Thaddeus  Stevens,  contained  in  his  work, 
"  The  Political  Conflict  in  America,"  tells  how 
this  mother,  during  the  terrible  spotted-fever 
plague,  became  a  ministering  angel  to  all  the 
people  for  many  miles  around  her  home, 
visiting  from  family  to  family,  and  reliev 
ing  their  needs  in  every  capacity  in  which  she 
was  able  to  help  them.  In  these  visits  she  was 
attended  by  young  Thaddeus,  who,  on  these 
circuits  of  mercy,  obtained  a  glimpse  of  life 
which  left  an  indelible  impress  on  mind  and 
heart  alike.  Such  sights  of  pain  and  poverty 
and  death  so  operated  upon  his  sensibilities  as  to 
make  him  ever  afterwards  kindly  disposed  to  the 
sick  and  poor  of  every  class.  rf  To  such,"  says 
Mr.  Harris,  "  to  the  end  of  his  life,  he  was  ever 
ready  to  extend  a  helping  hand."  Dr.  Henry 
Carpenter,  of  Lancaster,  who  was  Mr.  Stevens's 
physician  for  many  years,  as  well  as  an  intimate 
friend,  tells  the  following  incident :  Lydia  Jane 
P ,  a  Quaker  widow  of  considerable  literary 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  11 

taste  and  ability,  Avith  whose  husband  Mr. 
Stevens  had  been  well  acquainted,  was  left  with 
a  family,  and  in  very  destitute  circumstances. 
First,  Stevens  gave  her  a  farm  in  fee  simple. 
Then,  desiring  still  further  to  help  her,  he 
brought  her  eldest  son,  Byron  P ,  to  Lan 
caster  to  educate  him.  The  boy  had  disease  of 
the  knee-joint,  which  rendered  that  member 
stiff.  Soon  after  Byron's  arrival  in  Lancaster, 
Mr.  Stevens  called  on  Dr.  Carpenter,  and  asked 
him  if  he  had  noticed  the  boy.  He  replied  that 
he  had,  and  stated  his  trouble.  Mr.  Stevens 
said  that  a  good  many  physicians  had  been  con 
sulted,  who  said  that  nothing  could  be  done, 
and  asked  the  doctor  if  he  could  do  anything  to 
relieve  him.  He  replied  that  he  could,  and  after 
about  five  weeks'  treatment  the  boy  was  able  to 
walk  about.  And  as  soon  as  Mr.  Stevens  saw 
him  out  without  crutches,  he  was  delighted,  and 
expressed  his  thanks  and  gratitude  to  the  doc 
tor.  He  wished  to  know  what  the  charge  was, 
and  when  the  physician  replied,  that  it  was 
a  matter  of  benevolence  on  all  sides,  and 
there  was  no  charge,  he  insisted  upon  giving 
him  a  very  handsome  fee,  saying,  at  the  same 
time,  — "  Now,  doctor,  if  you  come  across 
any  poor  boy  that  is  deformed  or  disabled  in 
his  limbs  in  any  manner,  take  him  in  hand 


12  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

and  relieve  him,  and  I  will  pay  you  liberally 
for  it." 

So  Thaddeus  Stevens  was  born  to  poverty, 
enslaved  by  physical  deformity,  acquainted  with 
the  ills  of  others.  With  such  surroundings  in 
his  youth,  it  was  natural  that  he  should  follow 
straight  the  road  which  led  therefrom ;  to  toil 
for  those  who  could  not  work ;  to  speak  for 
those  whose  lips  were  dumb  ;  to  lift  the  trodden- 
down,  and  make  the  cause  of  the  oppressed  his 
own.  And  hence  a  commoner. 

The  place  of  his  birth  wras  Danville,  Cale 
donia  County,  Vermont.  The  date,  April  4, 
1792.  It  was  a  proper  year  for  his  birth.  It 
was  the  year  England  voted  the  gradual  aboli 
tion  of  the  slave-trade  !  It  was  the  year  that 
saw  Louis  XVI.  dethroned,  and  the  French 
Eevolution  born  !  It  was  the  year  that  prepared 
Hayti  for  Toussaint  and  emancipation.  I  say  it 
was  a  proper  year  for  the  birth  of  one,  who, 
more  than  any  other  man,  was  to  destroy  human 
slavery  and  pronounce  human  equality  on  this 
Western  Continent.  The  education  which  his 
mother  procured  for  young  Stevens  was  by  no 
means  inferior,  and  in  1815  he  graduated  at 
Dartmouth  College,  and  immediately  found  oc 
cupation  as  a  teacher  in  the  Academy  of  Dr. 
Perkins,  at  York,  Pennsylvania.  At  that  time 


TIIADDEUS  STEVENS.  13 

he  is  described  by  a  gentleman  who  then  resided 
in  the  same  place,  as  "  one  of  the  most  back 
ward,  retiring,  and  modest  young  men  he  had 
ever  seen." 

"  But  at  his  desk  he  had  the  look 
And  air  of  one  who  wisely  schemed, 
And  hostage  from  the  future  took, 
In  trained  thought  and  lore  of  books. 
Large-brained,  clear-eyed,  — of  such  as  he 
Shall  Freedom's  grand  apostles  be." 

Engaged  in  preparing  himself  for  the  law,  he 
passed  some  time  here  following  the  course  so 
many  great  advocates  before  him  had  trod  — 
teaching  by  day,  the  horn  books  at  night.  But 
when  the  time  had  come  for  admission  to  the 
bar,  to  his  surprise  he  found  the  door  closed. 
For  certain  members  of  the  bar  in  the  county 
where  he  had  been  living,  had  passed  resolutions 
to  the  effect  that  no  person  should  be  recognized 
as  a  lawyer  who  followed  any  other  vocation 
whilst  preparing  himself  for  admission.  The 
blow  was  aimed  at  Stevens.  It  is  difficult  to 
imagine  what  cause  of  dislike  they  possessed 
against  him.  Was  it  the  contempt  which  thor 
oughly  trained  lawyers  always  have  for  their 
less  fortunate  brothers,  who  are  obliged  to 
acquire  their  knowledge  in  the  hard,  practical 
road  of  life,  struggling  for  existence?  Or  did 


14  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

they  accuse  him  of  "  not  belonging  to  the  '  better 
element,'"  that  potent  argument  of  modern 
times  !  Or,  perhaps,  like  the  independents  of 
the  present  day,  who  cannot  find  a  flaw  in  an 
opponent's  character,  they  shrugged  their  shoul 
ders  and  said  darkly,  "  we  object  to  his  methods  "  ! 
Stevens  was  equal  to  the  emergency.  He  quietly 
made  his  way  to  Harford  County,  Maryland, 
where  he  applied  to  the  court  then  in  session  for 
admission,  was  examined,  a  certificate  granted 
him,  and  in  a  few  days,  settled  at  Gettysburg, 
he  began  the  practice  of  the  law.  The  exhibi 
tion  of  selfish  exclusiveness  and  discrimination 
on  the  part  of  the  York  bar  was  another  circum 
stance  to  urge  him  on  in  his  work  to  obtain  for 
all  an  equal  chance. 

It  was  a  dark  opening.  He  had  few  friends. 
He  had  little  money.  His  fellow-members  of 
the  bar  were  Pharisees  of  the  strictest  type. 
They  referred  to  him  as  the  "  club-footed  attor 
ney."  The  poorer  class  of  clients  came  to  him. 
Most  of  these  had  been  discarded  by  his  rivals. 
What  little  money  he  had  saved  slowly  dwindled 
away.  Poverty  stared  him  in  the  face.  Failure 
seemed  imminent.  At  times  the  hours  were 
unendurable.  At  times  he  determined  to  give 
up  the  profession.  Almost  broken-hearted  he 
struggled  and  struggled,  hope  ever  growing 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  15 

fainter.  Strange,  when  life  is  merely  a  scene 
of  invariable  melancholy,  where  every  moment 
is  a  moment  of  anguish,  that  we  should  wish  to 
continue  on  that  scene  and  prolong  that  moment, 
fearful  lest  the  next  may  bring  a  severer  fate. 
What  power  of  attraction  there  is  in  mere  exist 
ence,  with  its  illusions  of  joy  and  realities  of 
sorrow  !  And  yet  we  cling  to  it  like  the  ship 
wrecked  mariner  to  the  floating  spar.  The 
indomitable  will  his  mother  gave  him  was  all 
that  was  left  him,  when  at  last  the  morning 
broke.  A  murder  had  been  committed  in  the 
neighborhood.  So  brutal  were  the  circumstances 

o 

surrounding  it,  no  lawyer  of  standing  could  be 
retained  for  the  defence.  In  despair  the  friends 
of  the  accused  went  to  Mr.  Stevens,  who  accepted 
the  retainer.  To  the  preparation  and  trial  of 
this  cause  he  brought  all  his  talents  and  energy. 
The  verdict  was  against  his  client,  but  his  adroit 
and  brilliant  defence  was  as  great  a  surprise  to 
every  one  as  was  Patrick  Henry's  early  forensic 
triumph  when  he  "pleaded  against  the  parsons." 
The  lane  had  turned.  From  this  onward,  the 
sun  shone.  In  an  incredibly  short  time  his 
clientelage  assumed  large  proportions.  He 
became  a  real  estate  owner.  His  fame  spread 
through  neighboring  counties.  He  was  a  man 
of  influence  in  the  town.  Success  was  assured. 


16  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

In  those  days  a  lawyer's  reputation  could  be 
made  or  marred  by  a  single  case.  The  nearness 
of  Gettysburg  to  Maryland,  whence  slaves  were 
constantly  escaping  into  the  free  states,  gave 
opportunity  to  Stevens,  who  defended  many  of 
the  refugees,  to  take  a  close  look  at  that  pecu 
liar  institution,  curse  to  North  and  South  alike. 
That  look  left  lasting  impress.  In  other  years, 
the  sighs  of  his  unfortunate  clients,  fleeing  from 
slavery,  might  have  been  heard  in  the  philippics 
he  thundered  against  the  champions  of  barbarism. 
The  struggles  of  those  unfortunate  ones  found 
utterance  in  the  great  statutes  of  freedom  the 
commoner  spread  upon  his  country's  roll.  Could 
we  get  at  all  the  facts,  I  think  we  should  find 
this  early  life  at  Gettysburg  the  growing  period 
in  his  life,  the  heroic  time.  _13ne!s__lieart  goes 
out  to  a  man  struggling  as  lie  did  under  all 
difficulties — deformed,  friendless,  half  starved, 
hated,  perhaps  feared.  Fighting  terrific  odds ; 
fighting  alone.  Fighting  for  what?  Himself? 
You  cannot  explain  it  on  that  theory.  Was  it 
fame  ?  No  man  held  it  lighter.  Was  it  wealth  ? 
No  man  cared  less  for  it.  When  he  died,  they 
found  among  his  effects  bills  and  notes  to  the 
extent  of  a  hundred  thousand  dollars,  which  he 
never  pressed  for  payment,  knowing  the  makers 
needed  the  money  more  than  he  did.  That  long 


TIIADDEUS  STEVENS.  17 

struggle  had  something  deeper  in  it  than  mere 
gain.  You  can  trace  back  every  act  and  word 
of  his  life  to  those  bitter  days.  They  were 
times  of  terror  to  him.  But,  as  Emerson  says, 
"times  of  terror  are  generally  times  of  heroism." 
Stevens_found  the  door  of  "  the  throng,  miscalled 
society,"  closed  against  him  ;  saw  only  the  vices 
and  abuses  of  social  life,  its  knaves  and  dupes, 
and  he  was  arrayed  against  it.  He  had  visions 
of  misery  he  would  have  no  other  know,  and  his 
hand  was  opened  to  the  human  need.  He  had 
studied  his  profession  under  difficulties,  he  would 
extend  education  "  without  money  and  without 
price"  to  all.  He  had  looked  upon  the  victim 
of  the  fetter  and  the  lash,  and  he  labored  for  his 
release.  He  found  men  hostile  to  each  other, 
felt  the  truth  of  the  lines, — 

"  Amid  the  woods  the  tiger  knows  his  kind, 
The  panther  preys  not  on  the  panther  brood, 
Man  only  is  the  common  foe  of  man," 

and  he  would  break  the  barrier  which  separates 
them  and  offer  the  inheritance  to  all.  This  was 
the  result  of  those  early  difficulties.  It  was  a 
Gettysburg,  indeed,  —  a  mortal  struggle  and  a 
happy  victory. 


CHAPTER  H. 

MASON     AND     ANTI-MASON. ENTRANCE     INTO 

POLITICS. A  PENNSYLVANIA   LEGISLATOR. 

ON  September  26,  1831,  the  first  national 
anti-masonic  convention  assembled  at  Baltimore. 
Twelve  States  were  represented,  the  New  Eng 
land  and  Middle  States,  Ohio  and  Maryland 
making  the  number.  Among  the  delegates 
present,  the  following  stood  conspicuous  :  Abner 
Phelps  and  Amasa  Walker,  of  Massachusetts ; 
Benj.  F.  Hallett,  of  Rhode  Island;  William 
Henry  Seward,  James  Geddes,  Myron  Holley, 
and  William  G.  Verplanck,  of  New  York ;  the 
Vanderpoels,  of  New  Jersey ;  Samuel  McKee- 
han,  Owen  Stover,  and  Thaddeus  Stevens,  of 
Pennsylvania.  Massachusetts,  New  York,  and 
Pennsylvania  sent  complete  delegations.  Only 
one  delegate  was  present,  south  of  Mason  and 
Dixon's  line,  namely,  from  Maryland.  It  was 
the  first  national  political  convention  in  which 
Mr.  Stevens  had  a  seat ;  and  he  made  his  mark. 
The  delegates  from  the  Eastern  States  went 
home  with  the  inquiry,  "  Why  have  we  not  heard 

18 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  19 

of  Lawyer  Stevens  before  ?  To  them  he  was  the 
most  eloquent  man  in  the  convention.  On  Sep 
tember  28,  a  ballot  was  taken  for  President  and 
V ice-President,  resulting  in  the  nomination  of 
William  Wirt  (once  a  mason)  and  Amos  Ell- 
maker,  respectively.  Both  candidates  received 
one  hundred  and  eight  out  of  one  hundred  and 
eleven  votes  cast.  Mr.  Wirt's  letter  of  accept 
ance  was  admirable  in  its  tone.  Like  every 
thing  that  charming  man  did,  it  was  patriotic 
and  wise.  "Not  only,"  wrote  Mr.  Wirt,  "have 
I  never  sought  the  office,  but  I  have,  long  since, 
looked  at  it  with  tar  more  dread  than  desire, 
being  fully  aware  of  its  dreadful  responsibilities, 
and  of  the  fact,  demonstrated  in  past  experience, 
that  no  degree  of  purity  and  intelligence  that  can 
be  exerted  in  the  discharge  of  its  duties,  can 
protect  the  possessor  from  misrepresentation  and 
aspersion."  After  congratulating  the  convention 
that  the  object  of  its  members  was  not  to  pro 
scribe  all  who  were  masons,  but  merely  to  assert 
the  supremacy  of  the  constitution  and  the  laws, 
he  proceeded  as  follows  :  "  Any  secret  society, 
which  by  the  force  of  mysterious  oaths  and  obli 
gations,  and  by  the  extent  of  its  combination, 
seeks  to  disturb  the  action  of  our  laws,  to  set 
them  at  defiance,  to  ride  over  and  control  them, 
to  usurp  the  government,  to  hold  the  lives,  peace 


20  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

and  happiness  of  society  at  their  mercy,  and  to 
establish  a  reign  of  terror  over  the  initiated  and 
uninitiated,  is  a  political  monster,  as  fearful  as 
the  invisible  tribunal  of  Germany,  or  the  in 
quisition  of  Spain,  and  ought  to  be  extirpated, 
without  delay,  by  the  use  of  all  the  peaceable 
means  which  the  constitution  and  laws  of  our 
country  furnish."  Farther  on  he  declared  that, 
from  his  own  experience,  and  from  what  had 
been  told  him,  and  from  the  fact  of  Washington's 
connection  with  the  order,  he  assured  the  con 
vention  that  he  could  not  believe  the  intentions 
of  the  masons  were  at  war  with  their  duties  as 
patriotic  men  and  Christians.  "  I  have  continually 
regarded  masonry  as  nothing  more  than  a  social 
and  charitable  club  for  the  promotion  of  good 
feeling  among  its  members,  and  for  the  pecuni 
ary  relief  of  their  indigent  brethren . "  The  letter 
was  too  moderate  to  suit  the  more  ardent  anti- 
masons,  but  the  majority  felt  satisfied  that  it 
would  place  the  party  in  a  most  patriotic  light. 
Mr.  Wirt's  estimate  of  the  convention  may  be 
found  in  a  letter  written  by  him  to  Salmon  P. 
Chase,  under  date  of  November  11,  1831.  He 
there  says,  "  the  convention  was  one  of  the  most 
respectable  assemblies  I  have  ever  seen,  either 
in  a  legislative  or  any  other  character.  The  Chief 
Justice  of  the  United  States  [John  Marshall] , 


TIIADDEUS  STEVENS.  21 

and  several  other  gentlemen,  myself  among 
them,  were  invited  to  attend  a  reading  of  some 
of  their  reports ;  and  never  have  I  witnessed 
the  display  of  more  talent  and  dignity  on  any 
occasion."  But  the  campaign  was  one-sided 
from  the  start.  With  Gen.  Jackson,  Henry  Clay, 
and  Floyd  in  the  field,  the  race  was  a  hopeless 
one  for  Wirt.  But  throughout  it  all,  he  main 
tained  an  honorable  dignity,  a  freedom  from 
personality  and  a  patriotic  course,  rare  even 
among  the  best  of  men.  Xo  pressure  or  emer 
gency  ever  stirred  him  to  commit  any  sharp 
trick,  or  make  any  bargain.  Writing  to  his 
friend,  Judge  Carr,  December  5,  1831,  he  says  : 
"  It  has  been  suggested  to  me  by  a  clergyman, 
that  the  Presbyterians  are  thinking  of  coming  to 
my  aid.  I  belong  to  their  church.  They  are 
said  to  number  a  hundred  and  twenty  thousand 
votes.  My  advice  to  them  is,  to  stick  to  their 
religion,  and  not  to  sully  it  by  mixing  in  political 
strife.  They  will  make  more  hypocrites  than 
Christians  by  such  a  course."  Later  presidential 
aspirants  have  not  been  thus  delicate.  The 
result  of  the  contest  was  two  hundred  and  nine 
teen  electoral  votes  for  Gen.  Jackson,  forty-nine 
for  Clay,  eleven  for  Floyd,  seven  for  Wirt.  The 
seven  votes  received  by  Mr.  Wirt  came  from 
Vermont  (the  state  of  Thaddeus  Stevens'  birth) . 


22  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

At  this  day  it  is  hard  to  realize  the  height 
reached  by  party  spirit  in  this  attempted  de 
struction  of  masonry.  Prominent  men  deserted 
the  order.  That  the  movement  was  looked  upon 
by  wise  and  virtuous  men  as  proper  and  neces 
sary,  it  is  sufficient  to  point  to  the  names  of 
Adams,  William  Henry  Seward,  Myron  Holley, 
Carroll  of  Carrollton,  John  Marshall,  Richard 
Rush,  Pliny  Merrick,  and  Thaddeus  Stevens. 
These  men  believed  the  country  to  be  in  danger. 
The  abduction  and  murder  of  William  Morgan 
(who  had  in  press  a  work  detailing  the  secrets 
of  the  first  three  degrees  in  masonry)  by  prom 
inent  members  of  the  masonic  order,  aroused 
the  greatest  indignation  throughout  New  York, 
Pennsylvania,  and  New  England.  Those  who 
did  not  belong  to  the  order  saw  in  this  violation 
of  law,  an  attempt  to  subvert  the  liberties  of  the 
country.  In  the  titles  and  honors  of  the  order 
the  anti-masons  thought  they  saw  the  building 
up  of  an  aristocratic  and  feudal  hierarchy  which 
must  eventually  override  the  free  institutions 
of  the  land.  In  its  secrecy,  they  saw  plots  and 
treason.  "Standing  secrecy,"  said  Thaddeus 
Stevens,  "always  implies  shame  and  guilt."  In 
its  rules  and  regulations  they  saw  the  conceal 
ment  of  crime,  and  succor  to  the  vicious.  They 
charged  that  in  the  first  degree,  the  candidate 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  23 

pledges  himself  under  oath,  and  upon  forfeiture 
of  his  life,  if  he  does  not  redeem  the  pledge,  to 
ever  conceal  and  never  reveal  the  secrets  of 
masonry  which  he  has  then  received,  is  about  to 
receive,  or  which  ma}7  thereafter  be  entrusted  to 
him.  That  among  the  secrets,  which  the  candi 
date  may  and  must  be  instructed  in  if  he  takes 
the  second  degree,  is  that  of  his  pledge  of  pas 
sive  obedience  to  the  laws  of  all  the  lodges  and 
all  regular  summonses  sent  him  by  a  brother  of 
that  degree.  If  he  takes  the  third  degree, 
among  those  secrets  are  pledges  to  fly  to  the 
relief  of  a  brother  of  that  degree,  when  mason- 
ically  required  so  to  do,  at  the  risk  of  his  own 
life ;  should  there  be  a  greater  probability  of 
saving  the  life  of  the  brother  requiring,  than  of 
losing  his  own,  to  apprise  a  brother  of  all 
approaching  danger,  if  possible,  and  to  conceal 
the  secrets  of  a  brother  master  mason,  when 
communicated  to  him  as  such,  murder  and  trea 
son  only  excepted,  and  they  left  at  his  discretion. 
And  if  he  takes  the  royal  arch  degree,  among 
those  secrets  are  pledges  to  extricate  a  brother 
of  that  degree  from  danger,  if  he  can,  whether 
that  brother  be  right  or  wrong, — to  promote  his 
political  preferment  before  that  of  all  others 
of  equal  qualifications,  and  to  conceal  his 
secrets,  murder  and  treason  not  excepted,  so 


24  TIIADDEUS  STEVENS. 

that  concealment  of  crime  was  made  a  masonic 
duty. 

They  further  charged  that  Morgan  was  mur 
dered  on  the  19th  of  September,  1826.  That 
to  this  fearful  consummation  none  were  privy, 
but  those  who  had,  as  masons,  sworn  to  assist 
each  other,  right  or  wrong,  and  to  conceal  each 
other's  murder  and  treason.  That,  after  the 
murder,  all  the  precaution  possible  was  taken 
for  concealing  it,  but  this  not  proving  success 
ful,  and  legal  prosecution  being  threatened,  the 
criminals  frequently  met  and  consulted  together 
for  their  mutual  safety.  That  the  most  influen 
tial  among  them  insisted  that,  if  called  by  the 
legal  authorities  of  the  country  to  testify,  they 
one  and  all  must  swear  they  knew  nothing  of 
the  matter ;  otherwise  they  would  be  forsworn 
to  masonry,  and  might  lose  the  life  they  would 
thus  forfeit.  That  as  witnesses,  as  magistrates, 
as  sheriffs,  as  grand  jurors,  as  petit  jurors,  as 
legislators,  these  masons  and  others  with  whom 
they  were  intimate  would  know  nothing  about 
it.  That  in  all  their  civil  relations  they  violated 
their  oaths  and  most  sacred  duties.  That  they 
spirited  away  witnesses  they  feared  would  know 
too  much,  they  perjured  themselves  in  court, 
they  prevented  the  judicial  ascertainment  and 
punishment  of  the  foulest  criminals,  they  made 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  25 

common  cause  in  behalf  of  these  criminals 
against  the  rights  of  the  citizens  and  the  laws  of 
land.  When  people  cried  out  that  Washington 
was  a  mason,  they  admitted  that  Washington 
and  his  brother  officers  of  glorious  memory  were 
masons ;  but  pointed  to  the  fact,  that  farther 
than  the  third  degree  they  did  not  go  in  the 
early  days  of  our  independence,  that  Washing 
ton  never  visited  a  lodge  but  once  or  twice 
after  1768,  that  he  never  presided  in  one,  and 
that  afterwards  he  in  eifect  renounced  masonry. 
They  sneered  at  the  credulity  of  those  who  be 
lieved  in  the  antiquity  of  the  institution,  and 
showed  that  the  origin  of  speculative  masonry 
was  traced  to  the  year  1717,  in  England,  and 
the  averments  of  a  more  ancient  deduction  were 
entirely  fabulous.  No  arguments  could  make 
an  anti-mason  think  otherwise.  He  believed 
the  nation's  life  imperilled,  and  he  cried  "  havoc, 
and  let  slip  the  dogs  of  war."  In  Massachusetts, 
Abner  Phelps,  Thomas  Walley,  William  Mar- 
ston,  and  others,  by  memorial,  prayed  Gover 
nor  Levi  Lincoln  to  interfere  and  put  a  stop 
to  masonry  within  the  borders  of  the  Bay 
State.  The  governor,  while  sympathizing  with 
many  of  their  views,  felt  his  official  position 
would  not  warrant  his  interference,  and  re 
fused  the  prayer.  In  New  York  the  mails  were 


26  TIIADDEUS  STEVENS. 

flooded  with  petitions  and  memorials 
the  governor's  aid.  But  the  best  organization 
of  the  anti-masons  was  to  be  found  in  Pennsyl 
vania,  shaped  by  the  hand  of  Thaddeus  Stevens. 
Open  as  the  day,  he  hated  the  secrecy  of  night. 
Believing  in  equal  opportunities  for  all,  his 
spirit  was  aroused  that  there  were  privileges 
and  rights  possessed  by  a  few,  which  could  not 
become  the  property  of  the  many.  Eemember- 
ing  the  Constitution  abolished  titles,  he  saw  in 
the  appellations  of  masonic  votaries  an  enmity  to 
the  spirit  of  our  laws.  He  looked  abroad  and 
saw  in  the  free  States  men  protesting  against 
the  exclusive  order ;  he  turned  to  the  baronial 
States  of  the  South  and  heard  no  murmur. 
Where  slavery  existed,  masonry  flourished ; 
where  freedom  and  equality  ruled,  it  decayed. 
His  mind  was  made  up.  This  way  his  path  led. 
No  privileges,  no  exclusive  rights,  no  imperium 
in  imperio  was  his  motto.  He  was  among  the 
first  to  take  up  the  cudgel,  and  the  very  last  to  lay 
it  down.  As  an  anti-mason  he  took  his  seat  in 
the  lower  house  of  the  Pennsylvania  Legislature 
in  the  fall  of  1833.  The  anti-masons  had  re 
ceived  a  severe  defeat  in  the  late  presidential 
campaign.  But  defeat  was  nothing  to  a  man 
like  Stevens.  He  immediately  made  himself  the 
leader  of  the  anti-masons,  and  organized  the 


TH  A  DDE  US  STEVENS.  27 

members  of  the  Legislature  of  that  persuasion 
into  a  thoroughly  trained  force,  of  which  he  was 
the  absolute  ruler.  His  first  step  was  to  intro 
duce  the  following  resolution  :  — 

"  Resolved,  That  a  committee  be  appointed  to 
inquire  into  the  expediency  of  providing  by  law 
for  making  Freemasonry  a  good  cause  of  per 
emptory  challenge  to  jurors  in  all  cases,  when 
one  of  the  parties  is  a  Freemason  and  the  other 
is  not ;  and  on  the  part  of  the  Commonwealth, 
in  all  prosecutions  for  crimes  and  misdemeanors, 
when  the  defendant  is  a  mason ;  and  also,  when 
the  judge  and  one  of  the  parties  are  Freema 
sons,  to  make  the  same  provisions  for  the  trials 
of  causes  as  now  exist  when  the  judge  and  either 
of  the  parties  are  related  to  each  other  by  blood 
or  marriage ;  and  to  make  the  same  provision 
relative  to  the  summoning  and  return  of  jurors, 
where  the  sheriff  and  either  of  the  parties  are 
Freemasons,  as  now  exists  where  they  are  re 
lated  to  each  other  by  blood  or  marriage ;  and 
that  said  committee  have  power  to  send  for  per 
sons  and  papers." 

On  the  second  reading  of  the  resolution,  the 
vote  was  thirty-four  yeas  to  forty-five  nays,  and 
Mr.  Stevens  was  defeated.  Nothing  daunted, 


28  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

he  held  closely  to  his  cause.  The  next  year,  on 
a  resolution  offered  by  him,  instructing  the 
judiciary  committee  to  bring  in  a  bill  to  sup 
press  masonry,  he  was  again  defeated,  the  vote 
standing  thirty-eight  to  fifty-eight.  But  the 
year  following,  he  secured  the  appointment  of  a 
committee  to  investigate  the  evils  of  Freema 
sonry  and  other  secret  societies.  This  com 
mittee  was  called  the  "  Star  Chamber  Com 
mittee."  It  at  once  entered  upon  its  work,  and 
subpoenas  were  served  upon  many  of  the  most 
distinguished  masons  in  the  State.  But  those 
who  had  received  subpoenas  refused  to  testify. 
They  claimed  the  State  had  no  right  to  interfere 
with  any  organization  which  did  not  hinder  jus 
tice  or  obstruct  the  laws ;  that  the  institution 
of  masonry  existed  when  the  Constitution  was 
adopted,  and  it  was  unconstitutional  therefore 
now  to  destroy  it ;  that  it  was  an  institution 
which  existed  for  mutual  enjoyment  and  im 
provement,  and  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States  guaranteed  the  right  of  pursuit  of  happi 
ness.  The  committee,  thus  balked,  appeared 
before  the  house,  and  asked  authority  to  com 
mit  for  contempt.  This  was  refused,  and  the 
investigation  fell  through.  Well,  this  was  a 
defeat,  some  will  say.  True,  but  the  general 
ship  displayed  by  Stevens  in  the  contest  won 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  29 

admiration  from  the  most  bitter  masons.  Look 
at  it  for  a  moment.  In  1831  the  anti-masons 
had  received  a  crushing  defeat.  The  movement 
received  a  decisive  check.  In  1833  and  in  1834, 
in  the  Pennsylvania  Legislature,  Stevens  and  the 
anti-masons  were  signally  defeated.  In  Massa 
chusetts,  and  even  in  New  York,  the  struggle 
was  at  an  end,  every  one  had  lost  his  interest  in 
the  matter.  But  in  1835  we  find  Stevens  has 
carried  his  point  and  obtained  his  committee. 
Now,  that  could  only  have  been  accomplished 
by  a  master  tactician.  That  required  the  highest 
grade  of  generalship,  and  it  was  given  by  Ste 
vens.  At  this  late  day  one  can  judge  coolly  of 
the  merits  of  that  struggle.  There  is  little  doubt 
that  those  masons  who  sympathized  with  the 
Morgan  crusade  forgot  their  civil  duties.  There 
is  also  little  doubt  of  the  fact  that  the  masonic 
fraternity  has  ever  contained  among  its  members 
many  of  the  best  patriots  this  country  has  pro 
duced.  But  there  is  one  thin^  the  agitation 

O  O 

produced  which  cannot  be  forgotten.  The 
attention  of  men  was  called  to  the  true  princi 
ples  of  republican  government,  to  the  impro 
priety  of  titles,  to  the  necessity  of  equal  privi 
leges  for  all,  to  the  great  ideas  of  freedom  and 
equality.  In  one  respect  this  was  of  vital  in 
terest  to  the  country.  Anti-masonry  received 


30  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

its  final  defeat  in  1835.  The  same  year  the 
abolition  of  slavery  became  a  question  of  na 
tional  importance  in  American  politics.  The 
anti-masonic  agitation  had  no  small  effect  in 
rousing  the  anti-slavery  sentiment.  The  one 
question  disappeared,  the  other  made  the 
most  important  issue  in  our  politics.  I  think 
the  desire  of  equality  and  freedom,  which  ani 
mated  the  anti-masons,  was  not  destroyed,  but 
was  transferred  to  the  anti-slavery  movement. 
Why  there  should  have  existed  at  that  particular 
time  such  a  burning  thirst  for  freedom  and 
equality  in  the  breasts  of  so  many,  cannot  be 
explained.  Like  as  at  certain  periods  in  the 
world's  history,  assassination  and  atheism  have 
been  epidemic.  You  cannot  explain  it.  You 
cannot  hide  it.  It  exists.  That  is  sufficient. 
It  is  in  the  air.  Many  of  the  distinguished 
anti-masons  became  the  leaders  in  the  new  agi 
tation.  Seward  and  Adams  and  Holley  and 
Stevens  and  a  host  of  others  passed  into  the 
control  of  the  new  movement  that  was  to  be  the 
crowning  glory  of  America. 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE  FREE  SCHOOL.  —  THE  BUCKSHOT  WAR. 

THE  Pennsylvania  Constitution  of  1790  pro 
vided  that  "the  Legislature,  as  soon  as  may  be, 
shall  provide  by  law  for  the  establishment  of 
schools  throughout  the  State,  in  such  manner 
that  the  poor  may  be  taught  gratis."  But  it  was 
not  till  1834  that  a  bill  establishing  a  general 
free  school  system  could  be  passed.  And  then 
so  great  was  the  opposition  to  it  among  the 
Democrats,  that  at  the  next  election  an  anti-free 
school  Legislature  was  chosen.  [Strange  that 
the  Democracy  partake  so  largely  of  the  ad 
vantages  of  the  free  schools,  and  yet  so  bitterly 
antagonize  them.]  Thaddeus  Stevens  naturally 
enough  became  the  ardent  supporter  of  the  free 
school  educational  system,  and  was  its  special 
champion  on  the  floor  of  the  House.  The 
hostility  of  the  Democracy  and  the  wealthy  tax 
payers  of  Pennsylvania  to  its  new  education 
system  in  1835  is  almost  incredible  to  the 
present  generation  !  Mr.  Stevens  was  returned 
from  his  own  county  only  by  a  small  majority, 

31 


32  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

and  under  positive  instructions  to  vote  for  the 
repeal  of  the  law.  Instead  of  doing  so,  he 
became  its  chief  defender,  and  when  the  bill 
repealing  the  law  came  from  the  Senate,  where 
it  had  passed,  to  the  House,  he  made  what  is 
conceded  to  have  been  the  most  effective  speech 
of  his  life.  In  fact,  he  himself  styled  his  labors 
in  that  cause  as  "the  crowning  utility  of  his 
life ; "  and  at  another  time  he  remarked  he 
should  feel  himself  abundantly  rewarded  for  all 
his  efforts  in  behalf  of  universal  education  if  a 
single  child,  educated  by  the  Commonwealth, 
should  drop  a  tear  of  gratitude  on  his  grave. 
During  its  delivery  in  the  hall  of  the  House 
at  Harrisburg,  the  scene  was  dramatic  and 
the  interest  intense.  The  orator  was  forty- 
three  years  old.  He  was  in  the  fullness  of  his 
vigor.  There  was  nothing  weak  or  literary 
about  him.  His  action  was  virile.  His  classic 
countenance,  noble  voice,  and  directness  of 
style,  coupled  with  the  glorious  cause  he  was 
advocating,  created  such  a  feeling  among  his 
fellow-members  that  for  once  at  least  a  Legisla 
ture  rose  superior  to  all  selfish  interests,  and 
obeyed  the  instincts  of  a  higher  nature.  The 
motion  to  repeal  the  law  failed,  and  the  number 
of  votes  pledged  to  sustain  it  Avere  changed 
upon  the  spot.  Inevitable  defeat  at  first  seemed 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  33 

imminent ;  but  an  unequivocal  victory  was  the 
result.  The  free  school  was  saved  to  Pennsyl 
vania.  The  name  of  its  savior  was  Thaddeus 
Stevens.  How  hopeless  the  cause  appeared  at 
the  beginning  of  the  session  may  be  learned 
from  the  fact  that  there  were  presented  to  the 
Legislature  558  petitions  with  31,988  names  in 
favor  of  the  Repeal,  and  only  49  petitions,  con 
taining  but  2,575  signers,  against  it ! 

For  a  brief  moment  I  would  call  the  attention 
of  the  reader  to  certain  events,  of  little  im 
portance  now  (save  so  far  as  they  show  the 
character  of  Mr.  Stevens  under  trying  circum 
stances)  ,  known  in  Pennsylvania  politics  as  the 
"Buckshot  War." 

In  the  election  of  1838,  Charles  J.  Ingersol, 
Democratic  candidate  for  Congress  in  the  Phila 
delphia  district,  was  declared  defeated  by  the 
first  count.  His  supporters  believed  him  to 
have  been  elected,  and  charged  that  frauds  had 
been  committed  in  a  district  known  as  the 
Northern  Liberties,  and  demanded  that  the 
whole  vote  of  that  district,  amounting  to  four 
or  five  thousand  votes,  should  be  thrown  out. 
This  they  asked  of  the  return  judges,  who 
numbered  ten  Democrats  and  seven  Whigs,  and 
who,  of  course,  decided  the  question  on  political 
grounds.  If  the  whole  vote  of  the  said  dirtrict 


34  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

was  disregarded,  it  made  a  vast  difference  in 
the  political  complexion  of  the  House  and 
Senate  at  Harrisburg.  As  the  judges  were 
divided,  two  sets  of  returns  declaring  different 
members  elected  were  forwarded  by  the  Whig 
and  Democratic  judges  respectively  to  the  Sec 
retary  of  State.  The  Whig  return  reached  the 
Secretary  first,  wherefore  he  chose  to  consider 
it  the  only  legal  one.  The  Whigs  said  they 
had  been  cheated  of  their  rights  by  Democratic 
canards  and  false  statements.  The  Democrats 
contended  that  the  Whigs  were  trying  to  force 
a  minority  representation  on  them.  Which 
delegation  would  be  received  at  Harrisburg 
was  the  one  question  on  everybody's  lips. 
Thaddeus  Stevens  had  made  up  his  mind  early, 
as  usual;  and  immediately,  as  leader  of  the 
Whigs,  laid  his  adroit  plans.  No  man  ever 
received  such  Democratic  maledictions  as  he 
did.  Every  movement  of  the  Whigs  was 
charged  to  him.  It  was  said  he  was  encour 
aging  insurrection  and  disobedience  to  the  laws. 
He  was  called  an  arch  traitor,  a  destroyer  of 
his  country's  peace.  But  it  did  not  disturb  the 
commoner  in  the  least.  Nothing  in  the  way  of 
personal  abuse  ever  did.  He  relentlessly  pur 
sued  the  course  he  had  mapped  out.  At  eleven 
o'clock  on  the  forenoon  of  Dec.  4,  1868,  the 


TIIADDEUS  STEVENS.  35 

clerk  called  the  House  to  order,  and  both  of 
the  Philadelphia  returns  were  handed  in  and 
received  ;  so  the  two  delegations  were  ap 
parently  admitted.  So  close  were  the  two 
parties  numerically,  that  should  either  delega 
tion  be  thrown  out,  the  other  party  would 
organize  the  House.  Great  confusion  prevailed 
during  the  reading  of  the  roll  by  the  clerk. 
As  soon  as  the  clerk  finished  the  reading, 
some  one  nominated  one  William  Hopkins  for 
speaker,  and  tellers  were  appointed.  Now 
came  Mr.  Stevens's  opportunity.  He  rose  in 
his  place,  and,  in  a  clear  voice,  named  as 
speaker  Thomas  S.  Cunningham ;  appointed 
tellers,  himself  put  the  motion,  announced  his 
candidate  elected,  and  conducted  him  to  the 
chair.  Such  audacity  fairly  stunned  the  Hop 
kins  party.  But  they  soon  recovered,  and 
under  the  lead  of  Thomas  B.  McElwee,  pushed 
Cunningham  from  his  chair,  and  placed  the 
Democrat  in  his  stead.  And  now  the  great 
est  excitement  and  disorder  prevailed.  Both 
speakers  were  sworn  in.  One  party  adjourned 
the  House  till  2.30  P.  M.  the  next  day;  while 
the  other  faction  announced  that  the  House 
would  meet  the  next  day  at  ten.  But  the 
Democrats  left  trusty  guards  around  the  capitol 
and  firmly  held  the  same. 


36  THADDEUS  STETENS. 

At  the  meeting  of  the  Senate  there  was  great 
confusion ;  and  Stevens,  who  was  present  as  a 
spectator,  barely  escaped  with  his  life.  Harris- 
burg  trembled  with  excitement.  The  governor 
issued  proclamations ;  the  civil  magistrates  did 
likewise.  The  Democrats,  thinking  the  Whigs 
had  possession  of  the  arsenal,  surrounded  it, 
and  planted  cannon  in  front  in  order  to  lay 
siege  to  it.  Everywhere  men  could  be  seen 
moving  in  squads  as  if  an  insurrection  were 
imminent.  Committees  of  safety  and  commit 
tees  of  conference  were  appointed.  On  Dec. 
5,  the  governor  wrote  to  the  captain  of  the 
United  States  Dragoons  at  Carlisle,  impor 
tuning  him  forthwith  to  march  the  troops  at 
his  command  to  Harrisburg,  for  the  protection 
of  the  constituted  authorities  of  the  Common 
wealth,  for  the  suppression  of  the  insurrection, 
and  for  the  preservation  of  our  Republican  form 
of  government,  agreeably  with  the  Constitution 
of  the  United  States. 

Two  days  later  he  wrote  to  the  President  of 
the  United  States,  asking  his  aid  and  inter 
ference.  To  his  request,  the  President  (Mar 
tin  Van  Buren),  through  the  Secretary  of  War, 
made  an  unfavorable  reply.  "The  commo 
tion,"  he  wrote,  w  which  now  threatens  the  peace 
of  the  Commonwealth  of  Pennsylvania,  does 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  37 

not  appear  to  arise  from  any  opposition  to  the 
laws,  but  grows  out  of  a  political  contest 
between  the  different  members  of  the  govern 
ment,  most,  if  not  all  of  them,  admitted  to  be 
the  legal  representatives  of  the  people  consti 
tutionally  elected,  about  their  relative  rights, 
and  especially  in  reference  to  the  organization 
of  the  popular  branch  of  the  Legislature.  To 
interfere  in  any  commotion  growing  out  of  a 
controversy  of  so  grave  and  delicate  a  char 
acter,  by  the  Federal  authority,  armed  with 
the  military  form  of  the  government,  would  be 
attended  with  dangerous  consequences  to  our 
republican  institutions.  In  the  opinion  of  the 
President,  his  interference  in  any  political  com 
motion  in  a  State,  could  only  be  justified  by  the 
application  for  it,  being  clearly  within  the  mean 
ing  of  the  fourth  section  of  the  fourth  article 
of  the  Constitution,  and  of  the  Act  of  Con 
gress  passed  in  pursuance  thereof,  and  while 
the  domestic  violence  brought  to  his  notice  is 
of  such  a  character  that  the  State  authorities, 
civil  and  military,  after  having  been  duly  called 
upon,  have  proved  inadequate  to  suppress  it." 
The  governor  called  for  troops.  A  thousand, 
under  command  of  Gen.  Patterson,  came  from 
Philadelphia.  Gen.  Alexander  was  in  com 
mand  at  Harrisburg  of  a  number  of  troops 


38  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

from  Carlisle.  All  over  the  State  the  militia 
was  being  gathered  together  and  put  in  order 
for  marching  to  the  capital  at  a  moment's  notice . 
The  Cunningham  party,  seeing  the  danger  of 
longer  continuing  the  struggle,  and  feeling  per 
haps  that  their  opponents  had  a  primd  facie 
case  at  least,  weakened  and  enough  deserted  to 
the  Hopkins  House,  to  give  that  organization 
a  decided  majority,  and  by  Dec.  25  all  had 
gone  over  to  the  Hopkins  Legislature,  save 
only  one  —  Thaddeus  Stevens.  He  could  die. 
He  would  never  surrender.  How  fiercely  par 
tisan  spirit  raged  in  this  remarkable  political 
contest,  may  be  seen  from  the  testimony  of 
Col.  Pleasanton,  which  I  find  in  Niles'  Na 
tional  Eegister,  vol.  57,  p.  27.  Col.  Pleasanton 
said:  "On  the  20th  of  January  last,  I  called 
to  see  Col.  McElwee,  a  member  of  the  House 
of  Representatives  from  Bedford,  on  some  pub 
lic  business,  at  his  lodgings  in  the  evening.  He 
was  undressed,  and  about  to  go  to  bed,  but 
entered  into  conversation  with  me  on  the  sub 
ject  of  my  business,  in  the  course  of  which  he 
referred  to  the  character  of  the  volunteer  troops 
from  Philadelphia,  who  had  been  in  service  in 
the  preceding  month  of  December  at  this  place. 
He  spoke  very  favorably  of  them,  and  said  that 
it  was  well  for  them  that  so  many  of  them  were 


THADDEU8  STEVENS.  39 

Democrats,  as  otherwise  they  would  never  have 
lived  to  have  reached  Harrisburg.  He  then 
stated  that  on  the  announcement  here  that  the 
troops  from  Philadelphia  would  obey  the  order 
of  the  governor,  and  wrould  march  for  Harris- 
burg,  it  was  agreed  by  himself  and  two  or  three 
others  whom  he  did  not  name,  to  prevent  their 
arrival  at  this  place  at  all  hazards,  supposing  at 
the  moment  that,  as  the  troops  belonged  to 
Philadelphia,  they  were  all  Whigs,  and  favorable 
to  the  State  administration.  To  carry  out  this 
agreement,  he  said  it  was  determined  to  remove 
a  few  of  the  rails  on  the  railroad  at  the  most 
dangerous  part  of  it,  and  also  to  form  a  mine 
under  the  most  exposed  part,  to  be  filled  with 
gunpowder,  so  that  in  the  confusion  which 
would  arise  from  the  train  of  cars  containing 
the  troops  being  overthrown  by  thus  running 
off  the  track,  the  mine  might  be  sprung,  and  the 
whole  body  of  them  be  blown  into  the  air 
together!  For  this  purpose,  he  himself  had 
purchased  three  barrels  of  gunpowder,  and 
said  that  he  had  paid  forty  dollars  out  of  his 
own  pocket  for  the  purchase.  To  convince  me 
that  he  was  serious  in  what  he  stated  to  have 
been  their  design,  he  further  said  that  his  asso 
ciates  therein  were  men  of  tried  courage,  and, 
having  been  officers  of  the  army  during  the 


40  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

late  war,  knew  how  to  execute  the  project  they 
had  conceived.  This  design  was  abandoned  by 
them  in  consequence  of  information  having  been 
received  subsequently  to  the  purchase  of  the 
gunpowder,  that  the  troops  then  on  their  route 
from  Philadelphia  were  not  all  of  the  same 
political  party,  a  large  portion  of  them  belong 
ing  to  the  Democratic  party,  to  which  Col. 
McElvvee  and  his  associates  also  belonged. 
He  further  said  that  it  was  to  this  circumstance 
alone  that  the  arrival  of  the  troops  from  Phil 
adelphia  at  Harrisburg  without  injury  or  loss 
was  to  be  attributed.  The  design  was  aban 
doned  because  it  would  have  been  impossible  to 
have  separated  the  Democrats  from  the  Whigs 
in  its  execution,  and  protected  them  from  the 
danger  of  the  explosion." 

As  I  said  above,  Mr.  Stevens  did  not  go  over 
to  the  majority.  Pride  and  a  consciousness  of 
being  right  in  his  own  course  prevented  him. 
He  informed  his  constituents  that  he  believed 
the  organization  of  the  "  Hopkins  House  "  ille 
gal,  and  therefore  ought  not  be  expected  to  act 
with  it.  Still  he  agreed  to  attend  the  special 
session  to  be  held  in  May  of  that  year.  At  the 
very  beginning  of  the  session  his  enemies  en 
deavored  to  have  his  seat  declared  vacant.  A 
committee  was  appointed  under  a  resolution 


TH ADDS  US  STEVENS-  41 

offered  by  McElwee  to  investigate  Stevens's 
claim  to  a  seat  and  his  forfeiture  of  the  same. 
The  committee  gave  him  notice  of  the  time  and 
place  of  the  hearing.  To  all  of  which  he  sent 
a  protest*  stating  his  position.  Thirty-eight 
Democrats,  however,  entered  the  following  pro 
test  to  the  action  of  the  majority.  It  states  so 
clearly  the  principles  involved  in  the  discussion 
that  I  give  it  in  full. 

"  The  Protest  of  the  Democratic  Members  of  the  House  of 
Representatives,  against  the  proceedings  of  the  majority 
of  that  body  in  relation  to  Mr.  Stevens. 

"The  undersigned,  members  of  the  House  of 
Representatives,  present  the  following  reasons 
for  their  vote  on  the  resolution  that  the  admis 
sion  of  Thaddeus  Stevens  '  be  postponed  for  the 
present,  and  that  a  committee  of  five  be  ap 
pointed  to  investigate  the  claims  of  the  said 
Thaddeus  Stevens  to  a  seat  in  the  House  of 
Representatives  of  the  Commonwealth  of  Penn 
sylvania,  and  whether  he  has,  if  duly  elected, 
forfeited  his  seat,  by  mal-conduct.'  And  the 
undersigned  demand,  under  the  rules  of  this 
House,  that  these  reasons  be  placed  upon  the 
journal  thereof.  The  third  section  of  the  first 
article  of  the  Constitution  provides  that  '  no 
person  shall  be  a  representative  who  shall  not 
*  files'  National  Register,  Vol.  56,  p.  228. 


42  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

have  attained  the  age  of  twenty-one  years,  and 
have  been  a  citizen  and  inhabitant  of  the  State 
three  years  next  preceding  his  election,  and  the 
last  year  thereof  an  inhabitant  of  the  district  in 
and  for  which  he  shall  be  chosen  a  representa 
tive,  unless  he  shall  have  been  absent  on  the 
public  business  of  the  United  States  or  of  this 
State.'  It  is  not  disputed  by  the  majority  in 
this  House,  nor  by  any  member  of  it,  that  the 
qualifications  pointed  out  in  this  article,  or 
either  of  them,  are  possessed  by  Thaddeus 
Stevens ;  nor  is  it  pretended  that  he  was  not 
elected  a  representative  of  the  county  of  Adams, 
and  that  the  certificate  of  his  election  was  made 
out,  and  returned  through  the  Secretary  of  the 
Commonwealth,  according  to  the  provisions  of 
the  several  acts  relating  to  elections  now  in 
force,  and  in  strict  conformity  with  the  estab 
lished  usages  of  this  House. 

"We  contend,  therefore, — First,  That  in  the 
absence  of  a  constitutional  qualification,  the 
speaker  cannot  refuse  to  administer  the  oath  of 
office  to  a  member  elect,  when  he  appears  at  the 
bar  to  be  sworn  :  nor  can  the  House,  without 
an  illegal  assumption  of  power,  exclude  such 
member  elect  from  a  seat.  The  inquiry  contem 
plated  by  resolution  above  referred  to,  cannot 
therefore  be  ordered,  because  the  House  has  no 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  43 

power  to  punish  a  member  elect  for  mal-con- 
duct  before  admission.  It  matters  not  how 
grave  may  be  the  charges  brought  against  him, 
—  it  matters  not  how  gross  may  be  his  rnal- 
conduct  as  a  private  individual, — it  is  of  no 
consequence  th^it  he  may  have  spoken  or  written 
disrespectfully  of  the  House  or  its  members. 
The  Constitution  nowhere  indicates  these  things 
as  operating  to  disqualify  a  member  elect  from 
taking  his  seat  in  the  first  instance,  and  the 
House  has  no  legal  power  to  raise  a  committee 
to  try  an  offender  whom  they  have  no  power  to 
punish  if  found  guilty  of  the  charges  preferred 
against  him. 

"  We  contend,  —  Second,  That  the  principles 
advocated  in  this  House,  that  non-user  of  office 
is  sufficient  to  work  forfeiture,  is  false  and  un 
tenable  in  law  as  regards  an  elective  representa 
tive  office,  and  that  no  precedent  can  be  found 
even  among  the  parliamentary  records  of  Great 
Britain  for  the  establishment  of  such  a  doctrine, 
though  in  that  country  the  parliament  is  the 
supreme  power,  and  there  is  no  written  consti 
tution  to  restrain  it,  unless  the  Magna  Charta 
and  the  Bill  of  Rights  may  be  considered  to  be 
such.  It  is  true  that  in  England  there  are 
offices  of  an  executive  character  of  which  non- 
user  may  cause  a  forfeiture ;  but  even  there  the 


44  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

forfeiture  must  be  declared  while  the  non-user 
continues,  and  before  the  claimant  shall  appear 
to  assume  the  duties  of  his  trust.  In  a  Re 
publican  Government,  where  the  Constitution 
is  the  supreme  law,  no  forfeiture  can  take 
place  except  for  causes  indicated  by  the  Con 
stitution  itself. 

"  We  contend,  — Third,  That  this  House  has  no 
power  to  exclude  a  member  elect  for  writing  or 
speaking  contemptuously  of  the  House,  its  pro 
ceedings,  or  its  members,  because  a  member 
elect,  being  unqualified  by  oath,  is  to  such  in 
tents  and  purposes  a  private  citizen ;  and  the 
seventh  section  of  the  ninth  article  of  the  Con 
stitution  which  declares  that '  the  printing  press 
shall  be  free  to  every  person  who  undertakes  to 
examine  the  proceedings  of  the  legislature  or 
any  branch  of  government,  and  no  law  shall 
ever  be  made  to  restrain  the  right  thereof,' 

o 

withdraws  the  citizen  from  any  jurisdiction 
which  the  legislature  may  seek  to  exercise  for 
the  use  of  this  privilege. 

"  We  contend,  —  Fourth,  That  no  vacancy  has 
been  created  in  the  representation  of  the  county  of 
Adams  by  death  or  resignation ;  and  that  in  no 
other  conceivable  mode  could  the  seat  of  Thad- 
deus  Stevens  have  been  vacated,  but  by  the 
action  of  the  house  or  by  law.  He  could  not 


Til  A  DDE  US  STEVENS.  45 

be  expelled,  because  he  was  not  a  qualified 
member  of  the  house,  and  the  house  had  no 
power  of  expulsion  from  a  seat  he  did  not  hold. 

"It  cannot  be  pretended  that  he  has  resigned, 
for  the  reason  that  he  could  not  resign  to  any 
other  than  the  presiding  officer  of  the  body  of 
which  he  was  a  member  elect ;  and  no  such 
resignation  has  been  made.  The  people  of 
Adams  county,  who  elected  him  to  a  seat  in 
this  house,  could  not  have  received  his  resigna 
tion,  nor  could  they  have  proceeded  to  fill  by  a 
new  election  the  place  so  resigned ;  because 
such  an  election  would  not  be  valid  under  the 
Constitution,  nor  could  the  house  have  recog 
nized  the  validity  by  receiving  the  returns. 

"If  a  vacancy  could  have  been  created  by  a 
resolution  of  the  house,  or  by  law,  then,  if 
such  resolution  or  law  had  been  passed,  it  would 
have  been  the  duty  of  the  speaker,  in  accordance 
with  the  nineteenth  section  of  the  first  article  of 
the  Constitution,  and  the  provisions  of  the  act 
of  the  10th  of  February,  1799,  to  issue  his  writ 
directed  to  the  sheriff  of  Adams  county,  com 
manding  him,  on  a  day  therein  expressed,  to 
hold  an  election  for  the  supply  of  the  vacancy. 
No  such  resolution  or  law  has  been  passed,  and 
therefore  the  right  of  Thaddeus  Stevens  to  a 
seat  in  this  House  has  never  been  impaired,  and 


46  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

cannot  now  be  disputed.  For  these  reasons  the 
undersigned  do  solemnly  PROTEST  against  the 
majority  in  refusing  to  admit  Thaddeus  Stevens, 
a  member  elect  from  the  county  of  Adams,  to 
his  seat  in  this  House  —  believing  that  such  a 

o 

refusal  is  a  direct  violation  of  the  law  and  the 
Constitution,  and  involves  a  principle  destructive 
of  the  rights  and  liberties  of  the  people  of  this 
Commonwealth . " 

The  committee  appointed  under  McElwee's 
resolution  made  a  report  adverse  to  Mr.  Stevens, 
and  on  the  resolution  declaring  the  seat  of  Mr. 
Stevens  vacant,  the  vote  was  fifty-eight  in  favor 
of,  to  thirty-four  against,  the  resolution.  A 
special  election  was  thereupon  ordered,  and  Mr. 
Stevens  was  chosen  by  a  handsome  vote.  He 
then  presented  himself  to  the  legislature  and 
took  the  oath  of  office.  I  am  indebted  to  Niles' 
Register*  for  Mr.  Stevens's  address  to  his  con 
stituents  at  the  time  of  this  special  election. 
The  address  is  as  follows :  — 

"  FELLOW-CITIZENS  :  In  accordance  with  your 
wishes,  I  presented  myself  to  the  body  now 
exercising  the  duties  of  the  House  of  Represen 
tatives  of  this  Commonwealth,  and  desired  to 
have  administered  to  me  the  oath  prescribed  by 

*  Vol.  56,  p.  21G. 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  47 

law.  A  majority  of  that  body,  using  the  same 
unconstitutional  and  unlawful  means  which 
invested  them  with  official  authority,  refused  to 
allow  me  to  occupy  that  seat  to  which  I  had 
been  called  by  the  free  choice  of  my  fellow- 
citizens.  Under  the  most  shallow,  hypocritical 
and  false  pretences,  they  have  declared  my  seat 
vacant,  and  imposed  upon  you  the  expense  of  a 
new  election,  to  be  held  on  the  14th  of  June 
next.  In  doing  so,  they  have  committed  an 
unprecedented  outrage  on  the  rights  of  the 
people.  If  submitted  to  by  the  people,  liberty 
has  become  but  a  mere  name.  Already  is  the 
Constitution  suspended,  and  the  most  sacred 
contracts  between  the  State  and  individuals 
are  violated  with  the  most  daring  and  reckless 

O 

audacity.  The  tyrants  who  have  usurped  power 
have  determined  to  oppress  and  plunder  the 
people.  It  is  for  you  to  say  whether  you  will 
be  their  willing  slaves.  If  they  are  permitted 
finally  to  triumph,  you  hold  your  liberty,  your 
lives,  your  reputation,  and  your  property  at 
their  will  alone. 

"I  had  hoped  that  no  circumstances  would 
occur  which  would  render  it  necessary  for  me 
to  be  again  a  candidate  for  your  suffrages. 
Both  my  inclination  and  my  interest  require  me 
to  retire  from  public  life.  But  I  will  not  exe- 


48  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

cute  that  settled  intention  when  it  will  be 
construed  into  cowardice  or  despondency.  To 
refuse  to  be  a  candidate  now  would  be  seized 
upon  by  my  enemies  as  evidence  that  I  distrust 
the  people,  and  am  afraid  to  entrust  to  them  the 
redress  of  their  own  wrongs.  I  feel  no  such 
fear,  no  such  distrust.  Without  intending  any 
invidious  comparison,  I  have  always  said  what 
I  still  believe,  that  the  people  of  Adams  county 
have  more  intelligence,  and  not  less  honesty, 
than  the  people  of  any  county  of  the  State.  To 
such  a  people  I  can  have  no  fear  in  appealing 
against  lawless  aggression.  To  them  I  appeal  to 
restore  to  me  that  which  was  their  free  gift,  and 
therefore  my  right,  and  of  which  I  have  been 
robbed  by  those  who  'feel  power  and  forget 
right,' 

"  I  present  myself  to  you  as  a  candidate  to  fill 
that  vacancy  which  was  created  to  wound  my 
and  your  feelings.  I  do  not  want  to  receive  a 
party  nomination  from  my  friends.  The  ques 
tion  now  to  be  decided  is  above  party  considera 
tions,  and  would  be  disgraced  by  sinking  it  to 
the  level  of  a  party  contest.  Every  freeman 
must  be  impelled  to  resist  this  public  outrage 
as  a  personal  wrong  to  himself.  Everything 
dear  to  him  in  his  country, — his  liberty,  the 
liberty  of  his  children,  and  the  title  to  his 


THADDEUS   STEVENS.  49 

property,  —  admonish  him  to  rise  above  every 
paltry  personal  consideration,  and  rebuke  tyr 
anny  at  that  great  tribunal  of  freedom — the 
ballot  box. 

"  While,  however,  you  are  determined,  reso 
lute  and  energetic,  let  me  implore  you  not  to 
imitate  the  example  of  our  oppressors,  but  do 
everything  calmly  and  temperately.  This  ad 
monition  is  hardly  necessary  to  the  orderly 
citizens  of  Adams  county  ;  but  when  oppression 
is  so  intolerable  as  at  present,  it  is  difficult  for 
the  most  peaceable  and  quiet  men  to  control 
their  indignation. 

"  With  respect  and  gratitude,  your  obedient 
servant,  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

"HAKRISBUKG,  May  25,  1839." 

It  is  interesting  to  note  how  the  "  whirligig 
of  time  brings  its  revenges  round."  A  year 
afterwards  this  very  McElwee,  who  had  taken 
the  leading  part  in  excluding  Mr.  Stevens,  was 
himself  expelled  from  the  Legislature  by  a  vote 
of  fifty-eight  to  twenty-six,  and  did  not  present 
himself  as  a  candidate  for  re-election. 

I  have  dwelt  on  this  subject  of  the  "  Buckshot 
War,"  not  because  it  is  of  any  special  interest 
to-day,  but  simply  because  it  gives  us  an  insight 
into  the  courage,  adroitness,  and  virile  tactics 


50  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

of  the  man  who  but  a  few  years  before  had  been 
described  as  "  backward,  retiring  and  modest." 
In  this  manner  does  defeat  and  difficulty 
strengthen,  while  success  weakens.  On  every 
question,  save  that  of  education,  had  he  suf 
fered  defeat ;  but  from  every  reverse  he  grew 
stronger.  Like  Antaeus,  invigorated  by  touch 
ing  his  mother  earth,  he  rose  the  stronger  for  the 
fall.  The  audacious  manner  in  which  he  nom 
inated  and  declared  elected  his  own  candidate 
for  speaker,  his  utter  lack  of  fear,  as  regards 
results  when  in  the  right,  his  aversion  to  com 
promise,  his  refusal  to  barter  away  his  manliness 
and  honor  for  personal  advantages,  were  typical 
of  the  man,  and  were  the  distinguishing  charac 
teristics  of  his  later  years.  The  Thaddeus 
Stevens  of  reconstruction  fame  is  plainly  re 
cognizable  in  the  representative  from  Adams 
county.  It  is  all  there,  —  courage,  power, 
persistency,  honor.  They  were  all  his.  In 
1841  he  left  the  Legislature  and  devoted  him 
self  to  his  profession.  At  the  time,  the  Harris- 
burg  Telegraph  paid  a  well  deserved  tribute  to 
Mr.  Stevens'  ability  and  character  as  a  legislator, 
which  I  now  append.  I  am  indebted  to  Mr. 
Harris's  work  for  knowledge  of  it :  — 

"  To  judge  of  the  varied  powers  of  Thaddeus 
Stevens,    it    is   only   necessary  to  review    his 


TIIADDEUS   STEVENS.  51 

course  during  the  brief  limit  of  the  present 
session.  In  this  review  would  be  included  his 
powerful  argument  on  the  right  of  petitions, 
even  from  a  meeting  of  repudiators ;  his  cogent 
appeals  on  the  necessity  of  placing  a  constitu 
tional  limit  to  the  State  debt,  and  taking  from 
any  future  Legislature  the  power  of  continuing 
the  present  system  of  wasteful  expenditure 
without  any  provision  to  meet  liabilities  in 
curred  thereby ;  his  able  and  practical  remarks 
on  the  vital  importance  of  the  protective  policy 
to  the  interests  of  our  nation,  showing  how  the 
flood  of  commerce  poured  into  England  under 
the  Navigation  Act ;  how  Holland,  once  the 
commercial  carrier  of  the  whole  world,  was 
paralyzed  under  the  influence  of  free  trade 
doctrines  ;  and  how  the  first  principle  of  legisla 
tion  demands  that  home  labor  should  be  fos 
tered  and  protected.  Whoever  has  heard  Mr. 
Stevens,  at  this  session  or  at  any  other,  cannot 
hesitate  to  accord  to  him  the  most  commanding 
abilities  and  sound  constitutional  sentiments. 
Hence  it  is,  standing  as  he  does,  a  giant  among 
his  pigmy  opponents,  that  every  shaft  of  malice 
and  invective  is  hurled  at  him  by  every  puny 
whipster,  who,  like  the  fool  of  Crete,  exposes  his 
waxy  softness  to  the  fervid  glow  of  his  eloquent 
reply. 


52  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

"  It  is  not  so  much  our  wish  to  eulogize  Mr. 
Stevens  as  to  direct  the  public  attention  to  the 
position  he  has  attained,  and  so  well  maintains. 
We  want  the  eyes  of  the  Commonwealth  directed 
toward  him.  We  want  him  judged  of  by  his 
acts,  and  not  through  the  false  medium  of 
political  vituperation.  We  desire  to  see  his 
course  scanned  with  impartial  discrimination, 
and  on  its  issue  we  want  our  Commonwealth  to 
pronounce  its  judgment.  If  he  varies  a  line 
from  the  most  matured  principles  of  legislative 
economy,  let  that  judgment  be  of  condemnation, 
but  if  he  pass  the  trial,  justice  demands  that  the 
praises  be  awarded  to  him  which  are  the  meed 
of  every  public  servant  who  has  labored  long 
and  faithfully  for  the  best  interests  of  the  Com 
monwealth." 

After  so  many  years  of  constant  political 
strife,  the  return  to  law  was  refreshing  to  Ste 
vens,  and  brought  him  needed  rest.  The  law 
is  a  jealous  mistress.  He  paid  her  the  demands 
she  exacted  in  industrious  toil  and  intense  appli 
cation.  What  occupation  is  so  delightful  as 
that  of  the  country  lawyer?  His  leisure  for 
thought  and  reading,  unharassed  by  the  impor 
tunate  inquiries  of  nervous  traders  !  The  respect 
shown  him  by  the  villagers !  His  supposed 
importance  to  the  existence  of  society !  All 


THADLEUS  STEVENS.  53 

this  and  more  make  the  life  of  the  country 
squire  quaint,  agreeable,  satisfactory.  But 
the  quiet  town  of  Gettysburg  was  not  the  field 
for  a  man  like  Thaddeus  Stevens.  His  place 
was  where  great  things  are  to  be  done.  Soon 
after  the  session  of  the  Legislature  closed  (1842) 
he  moved  to  Lancaster,  Penn.,  and  there  made 
his  permanent  home.  "With  astonishing  rapidity 
his  clientelage  grew.  Almost  immediately  he 
sprung  into  one  of  the  most  lucrative  practices 
in  Pennsylvania.  His  greatest  success  was  be 
fore  the  jury.  Here  was  his  throne.  He 
never  took  or  used  notes  of  the  evidence.  He 
relied  wholly  on  his  memory.  In  argument  he 
cited  but  few  authorities,  and  those  directly  to 
the  point.  He  always  examined,  before  they 
were  called,  the  important  witnesses  on  his  side. 
He  trusted  to  the  strength  of  his  own  case, 
rarely  indulging  in  lengthy  cross-examinations. 
He  moulded  the  "  twelve  honest  men  of  the  hun 
dred"  to  his  will.  He  was  not  a  first  class 
lawyer  in  the  true  meaning  of  the  term.  He 
was  too  great  a  man  to  be  that.  His  mind  and 
heart  were  too  ample  to  be  slaves  to  precedent 
and  mistaken  judgment.  Nor  yet  could  he  be 
called  an  eloquent  advocate  in  the  true  sense  of 
that  term ;  but  the  directness  of  his  attack  and 
the  fury  of  his  charge  swept  his  antagonist  from 


54  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

the  field.  His  earnestness,  his  singleness  of 
purpose,  took  the  place  of  rhetoric,  learning, 
and  style.  He  always  picked  out  two  or  three 
points  in  a  case,  and  spent  his  energy  on  these, 
and  thus  drove  into  the  minds  of  the  jury 
the  facts  on  which  he  relied  and  from  which 
they  could  not  escape.  Here,  as  everywhere 
else  with  him,  it  was  power,  will,  virility,  that 
gave  him  the  victory.  The  "  honey-tongued 
charms  of  persuasion"  were  not  his.  He  did 
not  endeavor  to  convince  his  antagonist.  He 
knocked  him  down  with  one  blow.  Some  stub 
born  fact,  some  bitter  sarcasm,  or  some  terrific 
conclusion,  felled  his  foe.  He  feared  no  one,  and 
all  dreaded  him.  He  was  successful  when  far 
keener  attorneys  failed.  He  was  always  on  the 
alert.  He  was  always  ready.  As  Cecil  said  of 
Lord  Burleigh,  "  he  toiled  terribly." 


CHAPTER   IV. 

THE    PHILIPPICS. 

IF  the  return  to  private  life  was  satisfactory 
to  Mr.  Stevens,  yet  its  quiet  was  tiresome,  and  he 
longed  for  a  wider  political  field  than  he  had  be 
fore  known.  So  in  1848  he  presented  himself 
as  a  candidate  for  Congress  from  the  Lancaster 
district.  He  was  nominated  in  the  Whig  con 
vention  and  was  elected.  When  the  31st  Con 
gress  met,  it  found  a  contest  awaiting  it  at  the 
very  outset.  The  election  of  Speaker  was  one 
of  the  most  exciting  struggles  that  had  occurred 
in  Washington  for  years.  Mr.  Stevens  was  no 
believer  in  the  false  prudence  that  dictates  a 
silent  and  reserved  course  for  a  congressman's 
first  term.  Being  elected  to  represent  his  dis 
trict,  the  commoner  felt  it  his  duty  to  put  his 
hand  to  the  plough  at  once.  He  entered  the 
fight  immediately, — nay,  more,  was  a  candidate 
for  Speaker  himself  this  very  first  year  of  his 
congressional  service,  to  the  extent  of  four 
votes.  And  so  great  was  the  confidence  placed 

55 


56  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

in  him  by  the  friends  of  freedom,  that,  accord 
ing  to  Joshua  Giddings,  the  eight  Free -Soil 
members  of  the  House  were  willing  to  vote  for 
him  (a  Whig)  for  Speaker  without  other  pledges 
than  his  antecedent  opinions  and  acts.  Mon 
day,  Dec.  3,  1849,  the  Thirty-first  Congress 
assembled.  It  was  a  notable  body.  In^  the 
Senate  sat  Hannibal  Hamlin,  of  Maine  ;  John  P. 
Hale,  of  New  Hampshire ;  Daniel  S.  Dickinson 
and  William  Henry  Seward,  of  New  York; 
Thomas  Corwin  and  Salmon  P.  Chase,  of  Ohio  ; 
Pierre  Soule,  of  Louisiana;  Jefferson  Davis  and 
Henry  S.  Foote,  of  Mississippi;  Thomas  H. 
Benton,  of  Missouri ;  Lewis  Cass,  of  Michigan  ; 
and  Sam  Houston,  of  Texas ;  —  while  high  above 
them  all  towered  the  great  triumvirate,  Web 
ster,  Clay,  Calhoun.  Nor  was  the  House  less 
distinguished.  Maine  sent  Elbridge  Gerry ; 
New  Hampshire  was  represented  by  Amos  Tuck ; 
Massachusetts  had  a  distinguished  delegation : 
Charles  Allen,  George  Ashmun,  Kobert  C.  Win- 
throp,  Julius  Rockwell,  Horace  Mann,  and 
others.  Alexander  Stephens,  Robert  Toombs, 
and  Ho  well  Cobb  were  there  from  Georgia. 
There  was  George  W.  Julian,  of  Indiana ;  Hum 
phrey  Marshall,  of  Kentucky ;  Joseph  M.  Root 
and  Joshua  Giddings,  of  Ohio  ;  and  David  Wil- 
mot,  of  Pennsylvania.  This  Congress  was  for- 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  57 

tunate  in  its  great  names,  but  it  needed  them 
all,  every  one  of  them.  Anti-slavery  had  be 
come  the  great  issue  in  the  country.  This  Con 
gress  was  to  grapple  with  that  question  at  any 
rate.  Everything  pointed  that  way.  Texas 
had  recently  been  annexed  against  the  protest 
of  the  Northern  free  States,  and  contrary  to  the 
promises  of  the  South.  The  North  was  aroused. 
She  had  been  sleeping  on  her  arms  too  long. 
She  did  not  fear  the  threats  of  the  South.  She 
distrusted  sometimes  the  faithfulness  of  her  own 
servants.  Seward,  notwithstanding  his  brilliant 
panegyrics  on  freedom,  was  ever  open  to  com 
promise.  Some  even  doubted  the  sincerity  of 
John  P.  Hale.  They  felt  with  him  it  was  a 
parliamentary  struggle,  in  which  tact,  wit,  com 
posure,  good  humor,  were  the  weapons.  True, 
Giddings  was  fearless  and  Chase  bold.  Horace 
Mann  let  no  opportunity  slip  to  record  himself 
among  the  lovers  of  freedom.  But  all  generally 
acted  on  the  defensive.  A  man  was  needed 
who  knew  how  to  attack  ;  who  'would  fly  at  the 
throat  of  the  monster,  Slavery,  and  hang  there 
like  grim  death.  Such  a  man  was  found  in 
Thaddeus  Stevens.  He  of  all  others  was  fitted 
to  hurl  the  spear  of  Ithuriel.  He  entered  the 
contest  without  reproach  and  without  fear. 
The  first  matter  before  the  House  was  the 


58  TH A  DDE  US  STEVENS. 

election  of  a  speaker.  On  the  first  roll-call, 
Howell  Cobb  received  one  hundred  and  three 
votes  to  ninety-six  for  Mr.  Winthrop,  there  being 
twenty-two  scattering.  The  second,  third,  and 
fourth  calling  of  the  roll  showed  little  change. 
The  next  day  there  was  little  change  in  the 
voting ;  so,  too,  on  the  third.  The  contest  went 
on,  day  after  day,  with  varying  changes.  On 
the  fortieth  ballot,  William  J.  Brown  received 
one  hundred  and  twelve  votes,  lacking  only 
two  of  an  election.  But  it  being  discovered 
that  Mr.  Brown  had  been  in  communicati'on 
with  David  Wilmot,  and  had  agreed  to  make  the 
committees  satisfactory  to  the  Free-Soilers,  he 
was  immediately  dropped  and  passed  out  of  the 
list  of  candidates.  Still  the  contest  went  on ; 
and,  finally,  on  Dec.  22,  a  resolution  that 
a  plurality  should  elect  having  been  passed,  Mr. 
Cobb  received  the  highest  number  of  any  one 
candidate,  and  was  declared  elected.  In  an 
nouncing  the  committees,  the  chair  placed  Mr. 
Stevens  on  the  judiciary,  to  which  position  he 
was  well  fitted. 

On  Feb.  20,  1850,  the  House  being  in 
committee  of  the  whole  on  the  state  of  the 
Union,  on  the  reference  of  the  President's 
Annual  Message,  Mr.  Stevens  delivered  his 
first  philippic  against  slavery.  He  began  by 


TITADDEUS  STEVENS.  59 

referring  to  the  means  used  in  the  slavery  dis 
cussion  by  members  from  the  South,  as  calcu 
lated  to  use  up  time,  without  advantage  to  the 
country,  and  as  being  revolutionary.  He  pro 
ceeded  as  follows  :  "  Here,  then,  we  have  a  well- 
defined  and  palpable  conspiracy  of  Southern 
members  combined  to  stop  the  supplies  neces 
sary  to  the  existence  of  the  government,  dis 
organize  and  dissolve  it,  until  the  bands  that 
bind  the  Union  together  are  severed,  and,  as 
a  gentleman  early  in  the  session  desired,  '  dis 
cord  reigns.'  .  .  .  Let  us  inquire,  what  is  the 
grave  offence,  the  mighty  wrong,  which  can 
justify  a  threat  big  with  such  portentous  con 
sequences  ?  The  refusal  of  Congress  to  propa 
gate  or  to  establish  a  doubtful,  or  even  an 
admitted  good  in  the  territories,  would  surely 
be  no  cause  for  rebellion  or  revolution,  much 
less  would  the  refusal  to  extend  an  evil,  an 
admitted  evil,  an  unmitigated  wrong.  Will  an 
intelligent  and  free  posterity  believe  it,  when 
impartial  history  records  that  the  only  cause  for 
this  high  threat  was  the  apprehension  that  the 
Congress  of  this  free  Republic  would  not  propa 
gate,  nor  permit  to  be  propagated,  the  institu 
tion  of  human  slavery  in  her  vast  territories 
now  free?  Yet  such  is  the  simple  fact.  It  is 
proper,  then,  to  inquire  whether  the  thing 


60  TEA  DDE  US  STEVENS. 

sought  to  be  forced  upon  the  territories,  at  the 
risk  of  treason  and  rebellion,  be  a  good  or  an 
evil.  I  think  it  is  a  great  evil  which  ought  to 
be  interdicted ;  that  we  should  oppose  it  as 
statesmen,  as  philanthropists,  and  as  moralists, 
notwithstanding  the  extraordinary  position  taken 
by  the  gentleman  from  Alabama. 

"  While  I  thus  announce  my  unchangeable 
hostility  to  slavery  in  every  form,  and  in  every 
place,  I  also  avow  my  determination  to  stand  by 
all  the  compromises  of  the  Constitution,  and 
carry  them  into  faithful  effect.  Some  of  those 
compromises  I  greatly  dislike ;  and,  were  they 
now  open  for  consideration,  they  should  never 
receive  my  assent.  But  I  find  them  in  a  Con 
stitution  formed  in  difficult  times,  and  I  would 
not  disturb  them."  With  a  master's  hand  he 
described  the  evils  of  slavery. 

"That  republic,"  said  he,  "must  be  feeble, 
both  in  peace  and  war,  that  has  not  an  intelli 
gent  and  industrious  yeomanry,  equally  removed 
from  luxury  and  from  poverty.  The  middling 
classes,  who  own  the  soil  and  work  it  with  their 
own  hands,  are  the  main  support  of  every  free 
government.  Despotism  may  be  powerful  and 
long  sustained  by  a  mixed  population  of  serfs 
and  nobles.  But  free  representative  republics, 
that  rely  upon  the  voluntary  action  of  the  peo- 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  61 

pie,  never  can.  Under  such  governments,  those 
who  defend  and  support  the  country  must  have 
a  stake  in  the  soil ;  must  have  interests  to  pro 
tect  and  rights  to  defend.  Slave  countries 
never  can  have  such  a  yeomanry  !  never  can 
have  a  body  of  small  proprietors  who  own  the 
soil  and  till  it  with  their  own  hands,  and  sit 
down  in  conscious  independence  under  their 
own  vine  and  fig  tree.  There  is  no  sound  con 
necting  link  between  the  aristocrat  and  the 
slave.  True,  there  is  a  class  of  human  beings 
between  them  ;  but  they  are  the  most  worthless 
and  miserable  of  mankind.  The  poor  white 
laborer  is  the  scorn  of  the  slave  himself.  For 
slavery  always  degrades  labor.  The  white 
people  who  work  with  their  hands  are  ranked 
with  the  other  laborers  —  the  slaves.  They  are 
excluded  from  the  society  of  the  rich.  Their 
associations,  if  anywhere,  are  with  the  colored 
population.  They  feel  that  they  are  degraded 
and  despised,  and  their  minds  and  conduct  gen 
erally  conform  to  their  condition.  The  soil 
occupied  by  slavery  is  much  less  productive 
than  a  similar  soil  occupied  by  freemen ;  men 
who  are  to  receive  none  of  the  wages  of  their 
labor,  do  not  care  to  multiply  its  fruits.  Sloth, 
negligence,  improvidence,  are  the  consequence. 
The  land,  being  neglected,  becomes  poor  and 


62  TEADDEUS  STEVENS. 

barren ;  as  it  becomes  exhausted,  it  is  thrown 
out  as  waste,  for  slave  labor  never  renovates 
its  strength." 

When  Mr.  Stevens  rose  to  speak,  few  of  the 
Southern  members  turned  to  hear  him.  In  fact, 
they  sat  with  averted  faces  as  if  it  was  a  matter 
which  in  no  wise  concerned  them.  But,  as  the 
speaker  depicted  the  evils  of  slavery  and  told 
them  unwelcome  truths,  they  turned  nervously 
in  their  seats  as  though  the  devil  had  come  to 
torment  them  before  their  time.  As  he  went 
on  and  showed  how  education  in  a  slave  com 
munity  must  be  inevitably  confined  to  the  rich ; 
as  he  told  them  that  their  boast  of  military 
glory  was  empty,  since  the  North  furnished  the 
soldiers,  while  the  South  gave  the  epaulettes 
merely ;  as  he  depicted  the  leprous  growth  of 
the  black  evil,  finally  destroying  the  whole  sys 
tem,  they  turned  with  anxious  gaze  toward  the 
man  who  was  eloquent  simply  because  he  had 
something  to  say  and  dared  say  it.  Nay,  they 
were  almost  awed  at  his  boldness  when,  turning 
toward  certain  representatives  from  the  North 
who  tried  to  face  both  ways,  he  cried  out  in  a 
voice  that  penetrated  the  whole  chamber  — 
"  Sir,  for  myself,  I  should  look  upon  any  North 
ern  man,  enlightened  by  a  Northern  education, 
who  would  directly  or  indirectly,  by  omission 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  63 

or  commission,  by  basely  voting  or  cowardly 
skulking,  permit  slavery  to  spread  over  one 
rood  of  God's  free  earth,  as  a  traitor  to  liberty 
and  recreant  to  his  God !"  How  all  that  must 
have  cut  poor  Winthrop,  who  had  directed  all 
the  powers  of  his  mind  to  find  a  way  to  act 
with  both  sides  on  a  question  to  which  there 
could  be  but  one  side.  Mr.  Stevens  told  them 
not  to  threaten  too  much,  that  though  the  North, 
and  especially  his  own  State,  had  sent  many  a 
doughface  to  Congress,  there  were  men  at  home 

O  O 

who  could  not  be  frightened,  and  then  closed 
with  a  peroration  which  cannot  be  omitted 
here. 

"  The  eloquent  gentleman  from  Virginia 
[Mr.  Seddon] ,  the  other  day,  in  his  beautiful 
peroration,  personated  the  great  States  of  Vir 
ginia,  Kentucky,  and  Louisiana,  and  in  their 
name  apostrophized  the  good,  and  I  will  add, 
the  great  man  who  now  occupies  the  executive 
chair;  and  in  their  name  besought  him,  as  he 
loved  the  place  of  his  birth,  the  place  of  his 
nurture,  and  the  place  of  his  residence,  not  to 
forsake  his  Southern  brothers  in  this  emergency, 
but  to  stand  by  them  in  the  defence  of  human 
bondage.  How  much  more  effective,  enduring, 
and  hallowed  would  that  eloquence  have  been, 
had  the  orator's  lips  been  touched  with  a  coal 


64  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

from  the  Altar  of  Freedom !  Then  could  he 
have  gone  with  friendly  anxiety  to  that  noble, 
benevolent  and  heroic  man,  and  admonished 
him  that,  although  he  had  gathered  all  the 
earthly  laurels  that  can  be  reaped  by  the  sickle 
of  death,  yet  if  he  would  have  his  name  descend 
to  posterity  with  increasing  lustre,  he  must,  by 
one  great,  just,  and  patriotic  example,  wipe  out 
the  only  spot  that  obscures  the  sun  of  his  glory. 
He  might  with  propriety  have  taken  with  him 
the  learned  gentleman  from  Alabama  [Mr. 
Hilliard]  and  together  have  pointed  him  to  that 
solemn  hour,  which  to  him,  and  to  all  of  us  who 
are  treading  the  down  hill  of  life,  must  soon 
arrive,  when  the  visions  of  ambition  and  of 
earthly  wealth  shall  have  passed  from  before 
his  eyes,  and  left  him  nothing  but  a  gaping 
grave, 

"  The  accomplished  gentleman  from  Alabama 
might,  with  peculiar  propriety,  do  what,  with 
profane  lips  I  dare  not,  go  to  his  illustrious 
friend,  and  with  fervid  piety  and  eloquence  more 
thrilling  than  that  which  made  Felix  tremble, 
implore  him  by  a  love  deeper  than  that  of 
birthplace,  of  nurture,  and  of  residence,  by  the 
love  of  his  own  immortal  soul,  to  be  warned 
in  time  by  the  awful,  the  inexorable  doom, 
'  Accursed  is  the  man-stealer ! '  He  might, 


TEA  DDE  US  STEVEN'S.  65 

perhaps,  have  pointed  him  to  the  gloomy 
journey  that  leads  through  the  dark  shadow, 
and  shown  him  how  ineffably  brighter  are  the 
glories  of  that  kingdom  where  all  are  free. 
Perchance,  too,  he  would  have  noticed  the 
thronging  thousands  travelling  to  that  same 
dread  tribunal,  summoned  to  give  evidence  of 
deeds  done  in  the  body ;  some  of  whom  were 
bondsmen  and  slaves  on  earth,  but  whose  dis 
embodied  spirits  were  then  disenthralled,  erect, 
tall  as  the  proudest  of  earth's  oppressors ;  and 
asked  him  to  inquire  of  his  own  conscience,  who 
wras  most  likely  to  meet  a  hearty  welcome  there 
—  he,  whose  cause  was  advocated  by  the  sup 
plicating  voices  of  thousands  with  whom  he  had 
dealt  justly  on  earth,  and  made  free  indeed,  or 
he,  whose  admission  should  be  withstood  by 
myriads  of  crushed  and  lacerated  souls,  showing 
their  chains,  their  stripes,  and  their  wounds  to 
their  Father,  and  to  his  Father :  to  their  God, 
and  to  his  Judge."  It  was  no  ordinary  moment. 
The  Southern  members  said  to  themselves,  "The 
enemy  has  a  general  now.  This  man  is  rich, 
therefore  we  cannot  buy  him.  He  does  not  want 
higher  offices,  therefore  we  cannot  allure  him. 
He  is  not  vicious,  therefore  we  cannot  seduce 
him.  He  is  in  earnest.  He  means  what  he 
says.  He  is  bold.  He  cannot  be  flattered  or 


66  TH ADDS  US  STEVENS. 

frightened."  Ithuriel  had  come  at  last.  Ever 
afterward  the  Abolitionists  turned  their  eyes 
towards  this  Pennsylvania  Whig,  who  without 
boast  or  promise  of  what  he  would  do,  had 
carried  the  war  into  the  enemy's  camp.  From 
that  day  on,  the  anti-slavery  cause  had  no  surer 
champion  on  the  floor  of  Congress  than  Thad- 
deus  Stevens,  the  slave  no  more  faithful  pro 
tector.  The  great  California  debate,  which 
made  and  ruined  so  many  reputations,  and 
brought  to  a  head  the  compromise  measures  of 
1850,  afforded  Mr.  Stevens  another  opportunity 
to  attack  the  slave  power.  Few  debates  have 
occurred  in  the  halls  of  Congress  so  important 
in  the  questions  involved,  so  remarkable  in  the 
character  of  the  participants.  If  that  debate  on 
Mr.  Clay's  compromise  resolution  buried  Mr. 
Webster,  it  is  equally  true  that  it  raised  Mr. 
Seward  to  the  highest  point  of  his  fame.  Poli 
ticians  said,  that  man  is  the  presidential  candi 
date  of  1856.  How  those  sentences  ring  even 
to-day !  How  the  great  son  of  York  thrilled 
his  audience,  as  with  earnest  face  and  voice 
trembling  with  emotion,  he  cried  out,  "Shall 
California  be  received?  For  myself,  upon  my 
individual  judgment  and  conscience,  I  answer, 
Yes.  For  myself,  as  an  instructed  representa 
tive  of  one  of  the  States  —  of  that  one  even  of 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  67 

the  States  which  is  soonest  and  longest  to  be 
pressed  in  commercial  and  political  rivalry  by 
the  new  commonwealth  —  I  answer,  Yes :  let 
California  come  in.  Every  new  State,  whether 
she  come  from  the  East  or  the  West  —  every  new 
State,  coming  from  whatever  part  of  the  con 
tinent  she  may,  is  always  welcome.  But 
California,  that  comes  from  the  clime  where  the 
West  dies  away  in  the  rising  East  —  California, 
which  bounds  at  once  the  empire  and  the  con 
tinent —  California,  the  youthful  queen  of  the 
Pacific,  in  her  robes  of  freedom,  gorgeously 
inlaid  with  gold,  is  doubly  welcome." 

It  was  three  months  after  Mr.  Webster's  sad 
speech  before  Mr.  Stevens  had  an  opportunity 
to  express  his  views  on  the  California  question. 
The  long  discussion  and  wrangle  in  the  Senate 
had  caused  a  feeling  of  disgust  at  the  subject  in 
the  minds  of  all.  But  so  great  was  the  stake 
that  the  public  mind  still  followed  the  debate, 
looking  for  some  outlet  that  could  bring  peace 
and  honor  to  the  distracted  nation.  On  June 
10,  1850,  in  committee  of  the  whole  on  the 
state  of  the  Union,  on  the  President's  Message 
relating  to  California,  Mr.  Stevens  delivered 
his  second  philippic.  The  power  to  admit  new 
States  he  claimed  to  have  been  express^  given 
by  the  Constitution,  but  to  have  been  limited  to 


68  TH A  DDE  US  STEVENS. 

territory  belonging  to  the  Union.  He  then 
went  on  to  assert  the  belief  that  the  legislation 
for  the  territories  was  conferred  on  Congress 
alone.  He  ably  controverted  Mr.  Clay's  propo 
sition  that  Congress  can  abolish,  prohibit  or 
establish  slavery  in  the  territories.  He  showed 
it  was  not  unjust  that  a  slaveholder  should  lose 
his  slave  property  by  removing  to  a  free  ter 
ritory,  because  the  common  law  did  not  recog 
nize  property  in  man,  and  quoted  in  support 
thereof  Lord  Mansfield's  famous  decision  in  the 
case  of  the  Somerset.  By  the  common  law,  if 
a  slave  escapes  from  a  slave  State  into  a  free 
State,  he  is  free.  That  principle  he  admitted 
was  prevented  from  operating  in  the  States  by 
a  clause  in  the  Constitution.  But  it  was  in  full 
force,  he  claimed,  in  the  territories  where  that 
provision  did  not  extend.  While  it  is  thus 
found  that  Congress  had  the  right  to  prohibit 
and  abolish  slavery  in  the  territories,  he  argued 
that  it  did  not  follow  that  it  had  the  power  to 
establish  it.  His  reference  to  his  critics  was  in 
his  most  bitter  style  of  personal  invective.  "I 
do  not  remember,"  he  said,  "  one  of  the  numer 
ous  gentlemen  wrho  have  referred  to  my 
remarks,  who  has  attempted  to  deny  one  of  the 
facts  or  refute  one  of  the  arguments  ;  they  have 
noticed  them  merely  to  vituperate  their  author. 


THADDEUS   STEVENS.  69 

To  such  remarks  there  can  be  no  reply  by  him 
who  is  not  willing  to  place  himself  on  a  level 
with  blackguards.  I  cannot  enter  that  arena. 
I  will  leave  the  filth  and  slime  of  Billingsgate  to 
the  fishwomen,  and  to  their  worthy  coadjutors, 
the  gentleman  from  Virginia  [Mr.  Millson], 
from  North  Carolina  [Mr.  Stanly],  from  Ken 
tucky  [Mr.  Stanton],  from  Tennessee  [Mr. 
Williams] ,  and  all  that  tribe.  With  them  I  can 
have  no  controversy.  When  I  want  to  combat 
with  such  opponents  and  such  weapons,  I  can 
find  them  any  day  by  entering  the  fish  market, 
without  defiling  this  hall.  There  is  in  the 
natural  world  a  little,  spotted,  contemptible 
animal,  which  is  armed  by  nature  with  a  fetid, 
volatile,  penetrating  virus,  which  so  pollutes 
whoever  attacks  it  as  to  make  him  offensive  to 
himself  and  all  around  him  for  a  long  time. 
Indeed,  he  is  almost  incapable  of  purification. 
Nothing,  sir,  no  insult  shall  provoke  me  to  crush 
so  filthy  a  beast ! "  Strong  as  was  his  hatred 
for  the  Southern  slaveholder,  it  was  the  Northern 
doughface  who  had  to  receive  his  utter  contempt. 
He  compared  the  two  thus :  "  I  entertain  no 
ill-will  toward  any  human  being,  nor  any  brute, 
that  I  know  of,  not  even  the  skunk  across  the 
way,  to  which  I  referred.  Least  of  all  would  I 
reproach  the  South.  I  honor  her  courage  and 


70  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

fidelity.  Even  in  a  bad,  a  wicked  cause,  she 
shows  a  united  front.  All  her  sons  are  faithful 
to  the  cause  of  human  bondage,  because  it  is 
their  cause.  But  the  North  —  the  poor,  timid, 
mercenary,  drivelling  North  —  has  no  such 
united  defenders  of  her  cause,  although  it  is  the 
cause  of  human  liberty.  None  of  the  bright 
lights  of  the  nation  shine  upon  her  section. 
Even  her  own  great  men  have  turned  her 
accusers.  She  is  the  victim  of  low  ambition — 
an  ambition  which  prefers  self  to  country, 
personal  aggrandizement  to  the  high  cause  of 
human  liberty.  She  is  offered  up  a  sacrifice  to 
propitiate  Southern  tyranny  —  to  conciliate 
Southern  treason."  At  another  time,  referring 
to  the  willingness  of  the  North  to  sacrifice  all 
principles  to  personal  gain,  he  said,  bitterly, 
"Some  of  my  colleagues  voted  for  all  those 
western  measures,  to  give  away  all  the  wet 
lands  to  States,  and  all  the  dry  lands  to  corpor 
ations  ;  and  slave  laws  to  the  South,  in  order  to 
get  a  tariff,  and  they  got  it  —  didn't  they?" 
Few  men  were  more  chagrined  at  Webster's 
change  of  face  than  Stevens.  He  had  been  led 
to  understand  that  Mr.  Webster  would  declare 
for  freedom,  and  when  the  blow  came  on  March 
7th  it  aroused  his  indignation  to  the  highest 
pitch.  In  the  closing  lines  of  his  California 


TEA  DDE  US  STEVENS.  71 

speech  it  is  supposed  he  had  the  great  New 
Englander  in  mind  when  he  said  :  "  Sir,  so  long 
as  man  is  vain  and  fallible,  so  long  as  great 
men  have  like  passions  with  others,  and,  as  in 
republics,  are  surrounded  with  stronger  tempta 
tions,  it  were  better  for  themselves  if  their  fame 
acquired  no  inordinate  height  until  the  grave 
had  precluded  error.  The  errors  of  obscure 
men  die  with  them,  and  cast  no  shame  on  their 
posterity.  How  different  with  the  great !  How 
much  better  had  it  been  for  Lord  Bacon,  that 
greatest  of  human  intellects,  had  he  never, 
during  his  life,  acquired  glory,  and  risen  to  high 
honors  in  the  state,  than  to  be  degraded  from 
them  by  the  judgment  of  his  peers.  How  much 
better  for  him  and  his,  had  he  lived  and  died 
unknown,  than  to  be  branded  through  all  future 
time  as  the 

4  Wisest,  brightest,  meanest  of  mankind.' 

So  now,  in  this  crisis  of  the  fate  of  liberty,  if 
any  of  the  renowned  men  of  this  nation  should 
betray  her  cause,  it  were  better  that  they  had 
been  unknown  to  fame.  It  need  not  be  hoped 
that  the  brightness  of  their  past  glory  will  dazzle 
the  eyes  of  posterity,  or  illumine  the  pages  of 
impartial  history.  A  few  of  its  rays  may  linger 
on  a  fading  sky,  but  they  will  soon  be  whelmed 


72  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

in  the  blackness  of  darkness.  For,  unless  pro 
gressive  civilization,  and  the  increasing  love  of 
freedom  throughout  the  Christian  and  civilized 
world  are  fallacious,  the  Sun  of  Liberty,  of 
universal  liberty,  is  already  above  the  horizon, 
and  fast  coursing  to  his  meridian  splendor,  when 
no  advocate  of  slavery,  no  apologist  of  slavery, 
can  look  upon  his  face  and  live."  From  these 
acrimonious  philippics  let  us  turn  for  a  moment 
and  view  another  side  of  Stevens' s  character. 
If  at  times  he  seems  bitter,  harsh  and  uncom 
promising,  we  are  to  bear  in  mind  that  he  was 
fighting  a  great  battle  where  the  amenities  of 
social  life  have  no  place.  He  was  bearing 
witness  to  great  truths,  and  "great  truths,"  said 
Vauvenargues,  "come  from  the  heart."  No 
warmer  heart  than  that  of  Thaddeus  Stevens 
ever  beat  in  the  human  bosom.  He  loved  his 
fellow-man  like  none  other,  and  his  friendship  for 
those  who  labored  for  the  welfare  of  mankind 
was  strong  as  iron.  He  was  bound  with  no 
slight  friendship  to  his  colleague,  Henry  Nes, 
who  died  Sept.  10,  1850,  and  whose  death  he 
announced  to  the  House  on  the  13th  of  the  same 
month.  In  describing  his  many  virtues,  one 
notes  how  strongly  he  dwelt  on  those  humanizing 
qualities  in  his  character  which  always  won  the 
affection  of  the  great  commoner. 


THADDEUS   STEVENS.  73 

"  Few  men  possessed  as  great  and  as  enviable 
popularity  as  Dr.  Nes.  His  popularity  was  not 
accidental  or  evanescent,  for  his  constituents 
had  known  him  from  his  childhood.  It  was 
founded  in  the  most  amiable  qualities  in  the 
human  heart.  Benevolence,  generosity,  and 
unfeigned  pity  for  misfortune,  were  prominent 
characteristics  of  his  nature.  No  child  of  afflic 
tion  was  ever  so  poor  or  humble  as  to  seek  his 
professional  or  pecuniary  assistance  in  vain. 
The  poor  and  the  afflicted  were  all  his  friends, 
and  their  sorrow  at  his  grave  will  do  more 
honor  at  his  obsequies  than  would  the  most 
splendid  equipages  of  the  great.  He  has  left 
behind  him  numerous,  respectable,  attached  and 
mourning  friends,  but  not  a  single  enemy.  If 
the  blessings  of  the  unfortunate,  and  the  sincere 
prayers  of  pure  and  grateful  hearts  can  furnish 
a  safe  passport  to  a  better  world,  his  has  been  a 
happy  exit  from  this." 

Mr.  Clay's  omnibus  bill  failed,  but  it  paved 
the  way  for  the  various  compromise  measures 
of  1850,  and  the  Thirty-first  Congress  ended  its 
days,  foolishly  thinking  that  it  had  saved  the 
Union  and  slavery  as  well. 

Dec.  1,  1851,  the  Thirty-second  Congress 
assembled.  Many  who  had  taken  so  prominent 
a  part  in  the  deliberations  of  the  previous 


74  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

Congress  were  no  longer  there.  Calhoim  was 
dead.  Clay  was  soon  to  follow.  Charles 
Sumner  sat  in  Daniel  Webster's  place.  Bent  on 
had  been  defeated.  The  old  regime  was  dying. 
A  new  light  was  coming  over  the  horizon. 

The  consideration  of  the  Army  Appropriation 
bill  afforded  Mr.  Stevens  an  opportunity  to  de 
liver  another  philippic  against  slavery.  It  was 
less  harsh  than  some  of  his  earlier  attacks,  but 
through  it  all  one  notices  that  grim  humor 
which  in  later  years  characterized  his  utterances. 
For  example,  in  referring  to  Robert  Toombs,  he 
said  :  K  But  the  gentleman  from  Georgia  —  I 
speak  of  the  gentleman  from  Georgia  only  —  a 
part  for  the  whole  —  and  when  you  take  a  small 
part  you  have  got  nearly  all."  In  closing,  he 
addressed  himself  directly  to  the  slaveholders 
and  warned  them  of  the  coming  storm  in  these 
words :  — 

"  Do  you  believe  that  the  North,  tame  as  she 
is,  when  so  often  trod  upon,  will  never  turn? 
And,  if  the  issue  shall  be  made,  the  result  cannot 
be  doubtful. 

"  I  know  your  answer  will  be  that  then  you 
will  vindicate  yourselves  by  a  separate  con 
federacy.  I  see  and  feel  that  this  is  the  tendency 
of  your  movement ;  but  are  you  quite  sure 
that  with  your  increasing  slaves  and  increased 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  75 

burdens,    you   can   protect   yourselves   against 
foreign  foes  and  servile  dangers? 

"You  could  find  no  nation  who  would  enter 
into  a  treaty  with  you  for  the  extradition  of 
your  fugitives  from  labor.  You  would  be  in 
constant  collision  with  surrounding  nations,  and 
war  would  ensue.  Your  chivalry  would  not 
permit  you  to  yield  upon  that  point.  And,  with 
impending  or  existing  wars,  might  not  some 
Spartacus  of  African  blood  arise,  and  call  his 
brethren  to  arms  to  shake  off  oppression  ?  With 
the  sympathies  of  the  civilized  world  in  their 
favor,  might  they  not  find  allies  who  would 
compel  you  to  grant  them  a  just  emancipation  ? 
These  dangers  are  not  to  be  treated  lightly.  St. 
Domingo  found  energetic  leaders  who  were  able 
to  inflict  terrible  retribution  upon  their  former 
masters.  The  ancient  gladiator,  with  an  army 
of  slaves,  ravaged  the  very  heart  of  Italy,  and 
for  three  years  held  one  of  her  richest  and  finest 
provinces  against  the  whole  imperial  power  of 
Rome.  I  know  you  would  scorn  the  idea  of 
treating  with  such  an  enemy,  but  if  it  be  true, 
as  your  greatest  statesman  has  declared,  that  in 
such  a  conflict  every  attribute  of  the  God  of 
armies  would  be  upon  their  side,  might  they  not 
bury  their  chains  beneath  the  ruins  of  your 
empire  ? 


76  THADDEUS  'STEVENS. 

"These  are  painful  reflections,  but  no  candid 
and  intelligent  statesman  can  calmly  contemplate 
passing  events,  and  exclude  from  his  saddened 
mind  these  fearful  forebodings.  May  the  sound 
sense  and  true  patriotism  of  the  American 
people  arrest  the  headlong  career  of  reckless 
men." 

With  such  bold  utterances  did  the  commoner 
address  the  supporters  of  the  slave  oligarchy. 
At  this  day  it  is  hard  to  realize  that  to  make  a 
speech  like  that,  at  that  time,  required  the  exer 
cise  of  the  greatest  courage.  But  Stevens  was 
never  found  wanting  in  that  regard. 

Mr.  Stevens  was  a  leader,  and  therefore  he 
must  have  followers.  But,  with  only  a  handful 
of  freemen  on  whom  he  could  rely,  it  was  folly 
to  attack  the  South  with  its  united  front.  His 
opportunity  had  not  arrived.  In  order  to  be 
master  he  must  have  forces  to  lead.  Even 
Archimedes  must  have  a  point  on  which  to 
rest  his  lever  before  he  can  move  the  world. 
From  1853  to  1859,  Mr.  Stevens  remained  a 
private  citizen,  attending  to  the  demands  of  an 
arduous  profession,  being  engaged  in  the  trial 
of  most  of  the  important  causes  before  the 
Pennsylvania  courts.  However,  he  watched 
every  move  on  the  political  chess-board,  and 
kept  himself  in  the  political  current,  allowing 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  77 

no  important  fact  to  escape  him.  During  these 
years  of  professional  activity  there  is  little  to 
tell  of  him.  He  himself  once  said,  "  I  have  no 
history ;  my  life-long  regret  is  that  I  have  lived 
so  long  and  so  uselessly."  But  if  his  life  was 
without  special  interest  at  this  time,  it  was  far 
different  with  the  political  world,  which  was 
teeming  with  new  ideas,  new  men  and  new  par 
ties. 


CHAPTER  V. 

AD   INTERIM  —  THE   GREAT  YEAR   1854  —  BIRTH 
OF   THE    REPUBLICAN   PARTY.* 

AT  the  presidential  election  of  1852,  the 
Democrats  had  a  popular  plurality  of  202,000. 
They  carried  twenty-seven  out  of  thirty-one 
States,  and  cast  254  electoral  votes  out  of  296. 
In  the  Senate  the  Democrats  had  a  clear  ma 
jority  of  fourteen,  and  in  the  House  a  majority  of 
eighty-four.  The  Free-Soil  party  had  polled 
only  157,000  votes.  Besides  this  immense 
advantage  there  were  other  circumstances  which 
aided  the  democracy.  The  finances  were  in  a 
healthy  condition.  Industry  and  trade  were 
signally  prosperous.  People  no  longer  grew 
excited  over  the  tariff  question.  The  great 
yield  of  gold  in  California  had  had  a  stim 
ulating  effect  on  enterprise  and  emigration ; 
and  the  North  was  getting  over  the  excitement 
engendered  by  the  fugitive  slave  law.  When 
the  Thirty-third  Congress  assembled,  a  bill  to 

*  See  Appendix. 
78 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  79 

organize  the  territory  of  Nebraska  was  referred 
to  the  committee  on  territories.  It  was  report 
ed  back  by  Senator  Douglass.  On  Senator 
Dixon  of  Kentucky  giving  notice  that  he  should 
offer  an  amendment  providing  that  the  act  of 
1820  (Missouri  Compromise)  should  not  be  so 
construed  as  to  apply  to  the  territory  contem 
plated  by  this  act,  nor  to  any  other  territory 
of  the  United  States,  Mr.  Douglass  had  the  bill 
recommitted.  Subsequently  the  bill  was  reported 
in  a  different  shape,  so  as  to  create  the  two  terri 
tories  of  Kansas  and  Nebraska,  with  the  pro 
vision  that  all  questions  pertaining  to  slavery  in 
the  territories  and  in  the  new  States,  to  be 
formed  therefrom,  should  be  left  to  the  action  of 
the  people  thereof  through  their  appropriate 
representatives,  and  that  the  provisions  of  the 
Constitution  and  laws  of  the  United  States,  in 
respect  to  fugitives  from  service,  should  be 
carried  into  faithful  execution  in  all  the  organ 
ized  territories  the  same  as  in  the  States.  In 
the  bill  admitting  Missouri,  (1820)  as  a  slave 
State,  was  the  following  section  : — 

"SECT.  8.  Be  it  farther  enacted,  That  in  all 
that  territory  ceded  by  France  to  the  United 
States,  under  the  name  of  Louisiana,  which 
lies  north  of  thirty-six  degrees,  and  thirty 
minutes  of  north  latitude,  not  included  within 


80  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

the  limits  of  the  State  contemplated  by  this 
act,  slavery  and  involuntary  servitude,  other 
wise  than  as  the  punishment  of  crimes,  shall 
be,  and  is  hereby  forever  prohibited." 

The  territory  which  the  Kansas-Nebraska 
bill  was  intended  to  organize  was  within  the 
above  prohibition.  In  that  part  of  the  bill 
providing  for  the  election  of  a  delegate  to  Con 
gress,  was  the  following  : — 

"  That  the  Constitution  and  all  laws  of  the 
United  States,  which  are  not  locally  inapplicable, 
shall  have  the  same  force  and  effect  within  said 
territory  as  elsewhere  in  the  United  States." 

But  the  amended  bill  as  reported  back  from 
the  committee  added  this  : 

"  Except  the  section  of  the  act  preparatory  to 
the  admission  of  Missouri  into  the  Union, 
approved  March  6,  1820,  which  was  super 
seded  by  the  principles  of  the  legislation  of 
1850,  commonly  called  the  compromise  meas 
ure,  and  is  declared  inoperative." 

Now  this  territory,  under  and  by  virtue  of  the 
sacred  terms  of  the  Missouri  Compromise,  had 
been  dedicated  to  freedom  forever.  Missouri 
had  been  admitted  on  this  condition,  and  the 
slave  power  had  her  slave  senators  and  repre 
sentatives  all  these  years.  This  proposition  to 
abrogate  the  Missouri  Compromise  roused  the 


TIIADDEUS  STEVENS.  81 

North.  The  North  felt  she  had  yielded  enough 
in  the  compromise  measures  of  1850,  and  this 
attempt  to  do  away  with  the  sacred  compact  of 
1820  brought  the  North  to  her  feet.  A  most 
exciting  debate  now  took  place  in  the  Senate, 
and  in  place  of  the  above,  the  following  reser 
vation  was  adopted : — 

"  Except  the  section  of  the  act  preparatory  to 
the  admission  of  Missouri  into  the  Union,  ap 
proved  March  6,  1820,  which  being  inconsistent 
with  the  principle  of  non-intervention  by  Con 
gress  with  slavery  in  the  States  and  territories,  as 
recognized  by  the  legislation  in  1850  (com 
monly  called  the  compromise  measure),  is 
hereby  declared  inoperative  and  void,  it  being 
the  true  intent  and  meaning  of  this  act  not  to 
legislate  slavery  into  any  territory  or  State,  nor 
to  exclude  it  therefrom,  but  to  leave  the  people 
thereof  perfectly  free  to  form  and  regulate  their 
domestic  institutions  in  their  own  way,  subject 
only  to  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States." 

The  bill  thus  amended  finally  passed  the 
Senate  by  a  vote  of  thirty-seven  to  fourteen. 
The  bill  passed  the  House  one  hundred  and 
thirteen  to  one  hundred.  It  was  approved  by 
President  Pierce,  and  became  a  law.  It  is  the 
last  straw  that  breaks  the  camel's  back.  The 
North  now  was  aroused  to  action.  The  Whig 


82  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

party  was  moribund.  The  power  of  the  Free- 
Soilers  was  contemptible.  Something  must  be 
done.  Something  was  done.  The  Republican 
party  was  born.  The  repeal  of  the  Missouri 
Compromise  opened  the  way.  There  were 
earnest  men  in  all  parties  who  were  unwilling 
longer  to  endure  the  crime  and  tyranny  of 
slavery.  To  unite  these  various  elements  was 
the  one  thing  necessary.  The  stalwart  State  of 
Michigan,  ever  true  to  justice  and  right,  took 
the  lead,  and  many  of  her  great  citizens,  among 
them,  names  now  of  proud  historic  import, 
issued  the  following  call  for  a  mass  convention 
of  freemen  :  — 


"  A  great  wrong  has  been  perpetrated.  The 
slave  power  has  triumphed.  Liberty  is  trampled 
under  foot.  The  Missouri  compromise,  a  solemn 
compact  entered  into  by  our  fathers,  has  been 
violated,  and  a  vast  territory,  dedicated  to  free 
dom,  has  been  opened  to  slavery. 

"  This  act,  so  unjust  to  the  North,  has  been  per 
petrated  under  circumstances  which  deepen  its 
perfidy.  An  administration  placed  in  power  by 
Northern  votes  has  brought  to  bear  all  the  re 
sources  of  executive  corruption  in  its  support. 

"Northern  Senators  and  Representatives,  in 


Til  A  DDE  US  STEVENS.  83 

face  of  the  overwhelming  public  sentiment  of 
the  North,  expressed  in  the  proceedings  of  public 
meetings  and  solemn  remonstrances,  without  a 
single  petition  in  its  favor  on  their  table,  and 
not  daring  to  submit  this  great  question  to  the 
people,  have  yielded  to  the  seductions  of  execu 
tive  patronage,  and  Judas-like,  betrayed  the 
cause  of  liberty:  while  the  South,  inspired  by 
a  dominant  and  grasping  ambition,  has,  with 
out  distinction  of  party,  and  with  a  unanim 
ity  almost  entire,  deliberately  trampled  under 
foot  the  solemn  compact  entered  into  in  the 
midst  of  a  crisis  threatening  to  the  peace  of 
the  Union,  sanctioned  by  the  greatest  names  in 
our  history,  and  the  binding  force  of  which  has, 
for  a  period  of  more  than  thirty  years,  been 
recognized  and  declared  by  numerous  acts  of 
legislation.  Such  an  outrage  upon  liberty,  such 
a  violation  of  pledged  faith,  cannot  be  submitted 
to.  This  great  wrong  must  be  righted,  or  there 
is  no  longer  a  North  in  the  councils  of  the 
nation.  The  extension  of  slavery  under  the 
folds  of  the  American  flag,  is  a  stigma  upon 
liberty.  The  indefinite  increase  of  slave  repre 
sentation  in  Congress  is  destructive  of  that 
equality  between  freemen  which  is  essential  to 
the  permanency  of  the  Union. 

"The  safety  of  the  Union,  the  rights  of  the 


84  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

North,  the  interests  of  free  labor,  the  des 
tiny  of  a  vast  territory  and  its  untold  millions 
for  all  coming  time,  —  and,  finally,  the  high 
aspirations  of  humanity  for  universal  free 
dom, — all  are  involved  in  the  issue  forced  upon 
the  country  by  the  slave  power  and  its  plastic 
Northern  tools. 

"  In  view,  therefore,  of  the  recent  action  of 
Congress  upon  this  subject,  and  the  evident  de 
signs  of  the  slave  power  to  attempt  still  further 
aggressions  upon  freedom  —  we  invite  all  our 
fellow-citizens,  without  reference  to  former 
political  associations,  who  think  that  the  time 
has  arrived  for  a  Union  at  the  North  to  pro 
tect  Liberty  from  being  overthrown  and  down 
trodden,  to  assemble  in 

MASS   CONVENTION, 

On  Thursday,  the  6th  of  July  next,  at  1  o'clock,  p.  M., 
AT  JACKSON, 

there  to  take  such  measures  as  shall  be  thought 
best  to  concentrate  the  popular  sentiment  of 
this  State  against  the  aggressions  of  the  slave 
power." 

At  the  time  and  place  appointed  the  conven 
tion  assembled,  but  the  city  hall  was  too  small  to 
accommodate  the  vast  number,  so  an  adjourn 
ment  was  had  to  a  beautiful  grove  adjacent  to 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  85 

the  city.  And  there,  "under  the  oaks,"  the  first 
Kepublican  convention  was  organized.  One 
of  the  moving  spirits  of  this  meeting,  in  fact 
its  master,  was  a  merchant  of  Detroit,  known 
then  only  as  Zach.  Chandler. 

The  resolutions  of  that  convention  were  the 
first  united  resistance  to  "the  shame  that  had 
cursed  the  country  for  seventy  years,"  and  were 
in  these  words  :  — 

"  The  Freemen  of  Michigan,  assembled  in 
convention  in  pursuance  of  a  spontaneous  call, 
emanating  from  various  parts  of  the  State,  to 
consider  upon  the  measures  which  duty  demands 
of  us,  as  citizens  of  a  free  State,  to  take  in 
reference  to  the  late  acts  of  Congress  on  the 
subject  of  slavery  and  its  anticipated  further 
extension,  do 

"Resolve,  That  the  institution  of  slavery, 
except  in  punishment  of  crime,  is  a  great  moral, 
social  and  political  evil ;  that  it  was  so  regarded 
by  the  fathers  of  the  Eepublic,  the  founders  and 
best  friends  of  the  Union,  by  the  heroes  and 
sages  of  the  Revolution  who  contemplated  and 
intended  its  gradual  and  peaceful  extinction  as 
an  element  hostile  to  the  liberties  for  which  they 
toiled  ;  that  its  history  in  the  United  States,  the 
experience  of  men  best  acquainted  with  its 
workings,  the  dispassionate  confession  of  those 


86  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

who  are  interested  in  it ;  its  tendency  to  relax 
the  vigor  of  industry  and  enterprise  inherent  in 
the  white  man ;  the  very  surface  of  the  earth 
where  it  subsists ;  the  vices  and  immoralities 
which  are  its  natural  growth ;  the  stringent 
policy,  often  wanting  in  humanity  and  speaking 
to  the  sentiments  of  every  generous  heart,  which 
it  demands ;  the  danger  which  it  has  already 
wrought,  and  the  future  danger  which  it  por 
tends  to  the  security  of  the  Union  and  our 
constitutional  liberties — all  incontestably  prove 
it  to  be  such  evil.  Surely,  that  institution  is 
not  to  be  strengthened  or  encouraged  against 
which  Washington,  the  calmest  and  wisest  of 
our  nation,  bore  unequivocal  testimony ;  as  to 
which  Jefferson,  filled  with  a  love  of  liberty, 
exclaimed :  '  Can  the  liberties  of  a  nation  be 
ever  thought  secure  when  we  have  removed 
their  only  firm  basis,  a  conviction  in  the  minds 
of  the  people  that  their  liberties  are  THE  GIFT  OF 
GOD  ?  that  they  are  not  to  be  violated  but  with 
His  wrath  ?  Indeed,  I  tremble  for  my  country 
when  I  reflect  that  God  is  just ;  that  His  justice 
cannot  sleep  forever  ;  that,  considering  numbers, 
nature  and  nationality  means  only  a  revolution 
of  the  wheel  of  fortune,  an  exchange  of  situation 
is  among  possible  events ;  that  it  may  become 
probable  by  supernatural  interference !  The 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  87 

Almighty  has  no  attribute  which  can  take  sides 
with  us  in  such  a  contest ! '  And  as  to  which 
another  eminent  patriot  in  Virginia,  on  the  close 
of  the  revolution,  also  exclaimed :  '  Had  we 
turned  our  eyes  inwardly  when  we  supplicated 
the  Father  of  mercies  to  aid  the  injured  and 
oppressed,  when  we  invoked  the  Author  of 
Righteousness  to  attest  the  purity  of  our  motives 
and  the  justice  of  our  cause,  and  implored  the 
God  of  battles  to  aid  our  exertions  in  its  defence, 
should  we  not  have  stood  more  self-convicted 
than  the  contrite  publican  ? '  We  believe  these 
sentiments  to  be  as  true  now  as  they  were  then. 
"Resolved,  That  slavery  is  a  violation  of  the 
rights  of  man  as  a  man ;  that  the  law  of  nature, 
which  is  the  law  of  liberty,  gives  to  no  man 
rights  superior  to  those  of  another ;  that  God 
and  nature  have  secured  to  each  individual  the 
inalienable  right  of  equality,  any  violation  of 
which  must  be  the  result  of  superior  force  ;  and 
that  slavery  therefore  is  a  perpetual  war  upon 
its  victims,  that  whether  we  regard  the  institu 
tion  as  first  originating  in  captures  made  in  war, 
or  the  subjection  of  the  debtor  as  the  slave  of 
his  creditor,  or  the  forcible  seizure  and  sale  of 
children  by  their  parents,  or  subjects  by  their 
king,  and  whether  it  be  viewed  in  this  country 
as  a  '  necessary  evil'  or  otherwise,  we  find  it  to 


88  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

be,  like  imprisonment  for  debt,  but  a  relic  of 
barbarism  as  well  as  an  element  of  weakness  in 
the  midst  of  the  State,  inviting  the  attack  of 
external  enemies,  and  a  ceaseless  cause  of 
internal  apprehension  and  alarm.  Such  are  the 
lessons  taught  us,  not  only  by  the  histories  of 
other  commonwealths,  but  by  that  of  our  own 
beloved  country. 

"  Resolved,  That  the  history  of  the  formation 
of  the  Constitution,  and  particularly  the  enact 
ment  of  the  ordinance  of  July  13,  1787,  pro 
hibiting  slavery  north  of  the  Ohio,  abundantly 
shows  it  to  have  been  the  purpose  of  our  fathers 
not  to  promote,  but  to  prevent  the  spread  of 
slavery.  And  we,  reverencing  their  memories 
and  cherishing  free  republican  faith  as  our 
richest  inheritance,  which  we  vow,  at  whatever 
expense,  to  defend,  thus  publicly  proclaim  our 
determination  to  oppose  by  all  the  powerful  and 
honorable  means  in  our  power,  now  and  hence 
forth,  all  attempts,  direct  or  indirect,  to  extend 
slavery  in  this  country,  or  to  permit  it  to  extend 
into  any  region  or  locality  in  which  it  does  not 
now  exist  by  positive  law,  or  to  admit  new  slave 
States  into  the  Union. 

"Resolved,  That  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States  gives  to  Congress  full  and  complete 
power  for  the  municipal  government  of  the  ter- 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  89 

ritories  thereof,  a  power  which,  from  its  nature, 
cannot  be  either  alienated  or  abdicated  without 
yielding  up  to  the  territory  an  absolute  politi 
cal  independence,  which  involves  an  absurdity. 
That  the  exercise  of  this  power  necessarily  looks 
to  the  formation  of  States  to  be  admitted  into 
the  Union ;  and,  on  the  question  whether  they 
shall  be  admitted  as  free  or  slave  States,  Congress 
has  a  right  to  adopt  such  prudential  and  pre 
ventive  measures  as  the  principles  of  liberty 
and  the  interests  of  the  whole  country  require. 
That  this  question  is  one  of  the  gravest  impor 
tance  to  the  free  States,  inasmuch  as  the  Consti 
tution  itself  creates  an  inequality  in  the  appor 
tionment  of  representatives,  greatly  to  the  det 
riment  of  the  free,  and  to  the  advantage  of  the 
slave  States.  This  question,  so  vital  to  the 
interests  of  the  free  States,  (but  which  we  are 
told  by  certain  political  doctors  of  modern 
times,  is  to  be  treated  with  utter  indifference), 
is  one  which  we  hold  it  to  be  our  rteht  to 

o 

discuss;  which  we  hold  it  the  duty  of  Congress, 
in  every  instance,  to  determine  in  unequivocal 
language,  and  in  a  manner  to  prevent  the  spread 
of  slavery  and  the  increase  of  such  unequal 
representation.  In  short,  we  claim  that  the 
North  is  a  party  to  the  new  bargain,  and  is 
entitled  to  have  a  voice  and  influence  in  settling 


90  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

its  terms.  And  in  view  of  the  ambitious  designs 
of  the  slave  power,  we  regard  the  man  or  the 
party  who  would  forego  this  right,  as  untrue  to 
the  honor  and  interest  of  the  North  and  un 
worthy  of  its  support. 

" Resolved,  That  the  repeal  of  the  'Missouri 
Compromise,'  contained  in  the  recent  act  of 
Congress,  for  the  creation  of  the  territories 
Nebraska  and  Kansas,  thus  admitting  slavery 
into  a  region,  till  then  sealed  against  it  by  law, 
equal  in  extent  to  the  thirteen  old  States,  is  an 
act  unprecedented  in  the  history  of  the  country, 
and  one  which  must  engage  the  earnest  and 
serious  attention  of  every  Northern  man.  And 
as  Northern  freemen,  independent  of  all  former 
party  ties,  we  here  hold  this  measure  up  to  the 
public  execration,  for  the  following  reasons  :— 

tf  That  it  is  a  plain  departure  from  the  policy 
of  the  fathers  of  the  Republic  in  regard  to  sla 
very,  and  a  wanton  and  dangerous  frustration 
of  their  purposes  and  their  hopes. 

tf  That  it  actually  admits,  and  was  intended  to 
admit,  slavery  into  said  territories,  and  thus  (to 
use  the  words  applied  by  Judge  Tucker  of 
Virginia  to  the  fathers  of  that  commonwealth), 
'sows  the  seeds  of  an  evil  which,  like  a  lep 
rosy,  hath  descended  upon  their  posterity  with 
accumulated  rancor,  visiting  the  sins  of  the 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  91 

fathers  upon  succeeding  generations.'  That  it 
was  sprung  upon  the  country  stealthily  and  by 
surprise,  without  necessity,  without  petition, 
and  without  previous  discussion,  thus  violating 
the  cardinal  principle  of  republican  government, 
which  requires  all  legislation  to  accord  with  the 
opinions  and  sentiments  of  the  people. 

rf  That  on  the  part  of  the  South,  it  is  an  open 
and  undisguised  breach  of  faith,  as  contracted 
between  the  North  and  South  in  the  settlement 
of  the  Missouri  question  in  1820,  by  which  the 
tranquillity  of  the  two  sections  was  restored  ;  a 
compromise  binding  upon  all  honorable  men. 

"  That  it  is  also  an  open  violation  of  the  com 
promise  of  1850,  by  which,  for  the  sake  of 
peace,  and  to  calm  the  distempered  impulse  of 
certain  enemies  of  the  Union,  and  at  the  South, 
the  North  accepted  and  acquiesced  in  the  odious 
'fugitive  slave  law'  of  that  year. 

"That  it  is  also  an  undisguised  and  unmanly 
contempt  of  the  pledge  given  to  the  country  by 
the  present  dominant  party  at  their  national 
convention  in  1850,  not  to  '  agitate  the  subject 
of  slavery  in  and  out  of  Congress,'  being  the 
same  convention  which  nominated  Franklin 
Pierce  to  the  Presidency. 

"  That  it  is  greatly  injurious  to  the  free  States, 
and  to  the  territories  themselves,  tending  to 


92  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

retard  the  settlement  and  to  prevent  the 
improvement  of  the  country  by  means  of  free 
labor,  and  to  discourage  foreign  immigrants 
resorting  thither  for  their  homes. 

"  That  one  of  its  principal  aims  is  to  give  to 
the  slave  States  such  a  decided  and  practical 
preponderance  in  all  the  measures  of  govern 
ment  as  shall  reduce  the  North,  with  all  her 
industry,  wealth  and  enterprise,  to  be  the  mere 
province  of  a  few  slaveholding  oligarchs  of  the 
South  —  to  a  condition  too  shameful  to  be  con 
templated. 

"Because,  as  openly  avowed  by  its  Southern 
friends,  it  is  intended  as  an  entering  wedge  to 
the  still  further  augmentation  of  the  slave-power 
by  the  acquisition  of  the  other  territories, 
cursed  with  the  same  f  leprosy.' 

"  Resolved,  That  the  obnoxious  measures  to 
which  we  have  alluded  ought  to  be  repealed, 
and  a  provision  substituted  for  it,  prohibiting 
slavery  in  said  territories,  and  each  of  them. 

"  Resolved,  That  after  this  gross  breach  of 
faith  and  wanton  affront  to  us  northern  men,  we 
hold  ourselves  absolved  from  all  '  compromises ,' 
except  those  expressed  in  the  Constitution,  for 
the  protection  of  slavery  and  slave-owners ; 
that  we  now  demand  measures  of  protection 
and  immunity  for  ourselves ;  and  among  them 


THADDEUS  STEFENS.  93 

we  demand  the  REPEAL  OF  THE  FUGITIVE 
SLAVE  LAW,  and  an  act  to  abolish  slavery  in  the 
District  of  Columbia. 

"  Resolved,  That  we  notice  without  dismay  cer 
tain  popular  indications,  by  slaveholders  on  the 
frontier  of  said  territories,  of  a  purpose  on  their 
part  to  prevent  by  violence  the  settlement  of  the 
country  by  non-slaveholding  men.  To  the  lat 
ter  we  say  :  Be  of  good  cheer,  persevere  in  the 
right,  remember  the  Kepublican  motto.  '  THE 
NORTH  WILL  DEFEND  YOU.' 

"Resolved,  That  postponing  and  suspending  all 
differences  with  regard  to  political  economy  or 
administrative  policy,  in  view  of  the  imminent 
danger  that  Kansas  and  Nebraska  will  be 
grasped  by  slavery,  and  a  thousand  miles  of 
slave  soil  be  thus  interposed  between  the  free 
States  of  the  Atlantic  and  those  of  the  Pacific, 
we  will  act  cordially  and  faithfully  in  unison  to 
avert  and  repeal  this  gigantic  wrong  and  shame. 

"  Resolved,  That  in  view  of  the  necessity  of 
battling  for  the  first  principles  of  Eepublican 
government,  and  against  the  schemes  of  aris 
tocracy,  the  most  revolting  and  oppressive 
with  which  the  earth  was  ever  cursed  or 
man  debased,  we  will  co-operate  and  be 
known  as  Republicans  until  the  contest  be 
terminated. 


94  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

Resolved,  That  we  earnestly  recommend  the 
calling  of  a  general  convention  of  the  free 
States,  and  such  of  the  slaveholding  States,  or 
portions  thereof,  as  may  desire  to  be  there 
represented,  with  a  view  to  the  adoption  of 
other  more  extended  and  effectual  measures  in 
resistance  to  the  encroachments  of  slavery  ;  and 
that  a  committee  of  five  persons  be  appointed  to 
correspond  and  co-operate  with  our  friends  in 
other  States  on  the  subject. 

"  Resolved,  That  in  relation  to  the  domestic 
affairs  of  the  State,  we  urge  a  more  economical 
administration  of  the  government,  and  a  more 
rigid  accountability  of  the  public  officers ;  a 
speedy  payment  of  the  balance  of  the  public 
debt,  and  the  lessening  of  the  amount  of  taxa 
tion  ;  a  careful  preservation  of  the  primary 
school  and  university  funds,  and  their  diligent 
application  to  the  great  objects  for  which  they 
were  created,  and  also  further  legislation  to 
prevent  the  unnecessary  or  imprudent  sale  of 
the  lands  belonging  to  the  State. 

"Resolved,  That  in  our  opinion  the  commercial 
wants  require  the  enactment  of  a  general  rail 
road  law,  which,  while  it  shall  secure  the  invest 
ment  and  encourage  the  enterprise  of  stockhold 
ers,  shall  also  guard  and  protect  the  rights  of 
the  public  and  of  individuals,  and  that  the  prepa- 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  95 

ration  of  such  a  measure  requires  the  first  talents 
of  the  State." 

I  have  given  the  platform  at  length  because  it 
states  the  issue  so  well  and  shows  the  mission 
of  the  Republican  party.  If  a  nation's  history 
is  best  read  in  its  laws,  a  party's  genius  is  best 
seen  in  its  platforms. 

The  nominee  of  the  convention  for  Governor 
was  Kinsley  S.  Bingham,  and  his  great  popu 
larity  combined  with  the  strength  of  the  new* 
party  gave  him  an  easy  victory.  On  July  13, 
1854,  the  first  Republican  convention  in  Wis 
consin  was  held,  the  members  being  those  "who 
were  opposed  to  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  Com 
promise  and  the  extension  of  the  slave  power." 
Massachusetts  folio  Aved  July  19,  1854,  and 
resolved  in  convention,  "that  in  co-operation 
with  the  friends  of  freedom  in  sister  States,  we 
hereby  form  the  Republican  party  of  Massachu 
setts."  In  this  same  convention  Mr.  Sumner 
said  :  "  As  Republicans  we  go  forth  to  meet  the 
oligarchs  of  slavery."  On  the  day  of  the  date 
of  the  Wisconsin  convention,  a  mass  convention 
was  held  in  Vermont  of  persons  "in  favor  of 
resisting,  by  all  constitutional  means  the  usurpa 
tions  of  the  propagandists  of  slavery."  On  the 
same  day  a  convention  was  held  in  Columbus, 
O.,  of  those  "in  favor  of  breaking  the  chains 


96  TIT  A  DDE  US  STEVENS. 

now  forging  to  bind  the  nation  to  the  car  of 
American  slavery."  In  both  Ohio  and  Vermont 
the  name  Republican  was  used  as  the  party 
designation.  Likewise,  on  the  same  day  with 
the  conventions  in  Ohio,  Vermont  and  Wiscon 
sin,  did  the  inauguration  of  the  Republican 
party  in  Indiana  take  place.  When  we  remem 
ber  that  the  history  of  the  nation  since  1860  has 
been  simply  the  record  of  the  Republican  party, 
and  when  we  remember  that  the  years  from  1860 
to  18  70  comprise  the  Heroic  Epoch  of  our  history 
shall  we  hesitate  to  declare  the  year  which  wit 
nessed  the  birth  of  that  grand  party  one  of  the 
landmarks  in  our  country's  progress  —  the 
great  year  1854  !  Up  to  that  time  parties  had 
been  formed  on  questions  of  locality,  mercantile 
interest,  constitutional  construction,  administra 
tive  reform.  For  the  first  time,  we  see  in  the 
platform  of  this  party  all  material  considerations 
trampled  under  foot  and  the  flag  of  liberty 
raised  to  the  fore.  Well  might  William  Henry 
Seward  say  that  the  Republican  party,  "  being 
founded  on  immortal  principles,  was  therefore 
indestructible  in  its  essence  and  eternal  in  its 
career."  It  was  born  in  weakness ;  it  was 
raised  in  glory.  It  started  as  the  defender  of 
the  friendless ;  in  a  short  time  the  rich  and 
powerful  crowded  to  it  as  a  protector.  It  owed 


THADDEU8  STEVENS.  97 

its  birth  and  glory  not  to  Christianity.  The 
churches  hastened  early  to  record  themselves  in 
favor  of  human  bondage.  It  was  something 
deeper  than  love  of  sects  that  brought  men 
together  in  that  great  combination.  It  was  the 
moral  sentiment  in  man,  to  whose  existence  we 
owe  what  is  pure  and  strong  in  this  world.  "  To 
the  energy  of  the  private  conscience,"  says 
James  Martineau,  "  God  has  committed  the  true 
welfare  of  the  race."  Whether  there  is  a 
Divinity  that  shapes  our  end  may  be  disputed 
by  some,  but  if  a  strong  proof  were  wanted  of  the 
existence  of  a  Divine  being,  I  would  point  to 
the  great  anti-slavery  struggle,  its  failures  and 
its  final  success  under  the  Kepublican  party,  as 
the  best  of  evidence.  Whenever  that  party 
was  just,  God  Almighty  was  to  it  more  than 
generous.  When  it  faltered,  disaster  awaited 
it.  When  it  was  true  to  its  convictions,  victory 
crowned  its  arms.  How  often  during  the  dark 
hours  1860-1864,  the  lightest  breath  might 
have  turned  the  scale  !  Suppose  Pickett  had 
charged  an  hour  earlier  at  Gettysburg !  Sup 
pose  the  "  Monitor  "  had  arrived  at  Hampton 
Roads  an  hour  later  !  Suppose  Granger  had  not 
driven  Longstreet  back  at  Chickamauga  !  Who 
forgets  Abraham  Lincoln's  solemn  prayer  and 
promise  to  free  the  slave  if  our  arms  should 


98  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

drive  the  invader  from  Maryland  !  Say  not  it 
is  all  chance  !  If  the  divine  finger  in  human  his 
tory  was  ever  seen  it  was  seen  there.  "  Some 
ships  come  into  port  that  are  not  steered."  If 
a  date  is  of  any  value,  the  date  of  the  birth  of 
this  party  of  liberty  should  be  imprinted  on 
every  school-boy's  mind,  for  it  is  the  birth  of 
freedom,  it  is  the  prelude  to  our  Heroic  Epoch  ! 
And  now  great  events  follow  each  other  rapidly. 
May  22,  1856,  Charles  Sumner  is  stricken 
down  in  the  Senate.  About  a  month  later  the 
first  national  Eepublican  convention  is  held  and 
Fremont  is  nominated  for  the  presidency,  and 
for  that  office  receives  1,341,264  votes,  against 
1,838,169  for  Buchanan,  and  874,534  for  Fill- 
more.  Now  following  fast  comes  the  Dred  Scott 
decision,  the  Lecompton  struggle,  the  Lincoln 
and  Douglass  canvass  in  Illinois,  Mr.  Se ward's 
"Irrepressible  Conflict"  speech  at  Rochester, 
and  finally  the  John  Brown  raid  and  his 
execution  December  2,  1859.  On  that  fatal 
date  Theodore  Parker,  about  to  die,  writing 
from  Florence  to  friends  in  this  country,  says  : 
"  Such  is  my  confidence  in  Democratic  institu 
tions  that  I  do  not  fear  the  final  result.  There 
is  a  glorious  future  for  America  —  but,  the 
other  side  of  the  Eed  Sea."  Nov.  6,  1860, 
the  old  regime  comes  to  an  end.  And  on 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  99 

Nov.  7,  1860,  Wendell  Phillips  announced  to 
his  excited  audience  in  Music  Hall  in  Boston, 
that,  "  if  the  telegraph  speaks  the  truth,  for  the 
first  time  in  our  history  the  slave  has  chosen  a 
President  of  the  United  States."  In  truth,  the 
Heroic  Epoch  had  begun. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

HEROIC   EPOCH. 

MR.  STEVENS'S  whole  heart  was  bound  up  in 
the  welfare  of  the  Republican  party.  He  was 
among  the  first  to  join  it,  and  he  never  deserted. 
He  was  a  delegate  to  its  first  national  conven 
tion,  and  as  a  Republican  representative  from 
Lancaster,  he  entered  the  Thirty-sixth  Congress 
Dec.  5,  1859.  He  was  past  his  prime.  He 
seems  to  have  realized  this,  if  we  may  judge 
from  his  remarks  at  the  obsequies  of  his  col 
league,  Hon.  John  Schwartz.  Speaking  of  him 
he  said  :  "  He  was  an  aged  man,  and  it  may  be 
thought  that  his  loss,  private  and  public,  was 
less  than  if  cut  off  in  the  vigor  of  manhood.  I 
may  be  so.  Mr.  Speaker,  there  are  but  few  in 
this  House  who  with  me  can  appreciate  the  force 
of  that  suggestion.  Who  can  realize  how  unfit 
he  is,  whose  energies  are  paralyzed  by  age  or 
disease,  to  mingle  in  the  turbulent  and  boister 
ous  arena  of  public  life?"  On  his  first  entrance 
into  Congress,  ten  years  before,  he  was  imme- 

100 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  ]01 

diately  engaged  in  a  contest  on  the  speakership 
question.  The  Thirty-sixth  Congress  afforded  a 
similar  struggle.  Mr.  Stevens  championed  the 
cause  of  Galusha  A.  Grow,  and  made  his  nomina 
tion  .  It  was  two  months  before  a  candidate  could 
be  elected,  and  the  fortunate  one  was  William 
Pennington  of  New  Jersey.  During  one  of  the 
debates  which  occurred  during  the  long  struggle, 
some  one  sneering  at  Stevens' s  pretended  knowl 
edge  of  affairs  at  the  White  House,  inquired 
where  he  obtained  it.  The  commoner,  with  a 
comical  look  on  his  face,  informed  him  he  must 
remember  the  President  was  one  of  his  constitu 
ents.  The  second  session  of  the  Thirty-sixth 
Congress  was  bound  to  be  a  stormy  one.  The 
election  of  Mr.  Lincoln  was  construed  by  the 
slave  States  as  a  warning  that  their  power  was 
at  an  end.  The  action  of  South  Carolina,  the 
embassy  from  Virginia  to  that  State,  the  weak 
ness,  nay,  criminal  negligence,  of  the  adminis 
tration,  offered  ample  opportunity  for  acrimoni 
ous  debate.  Mr.  Stevens  saw  plainly  that  there 
could  be  no  compromise,  no  peaceable  secession. 
The  only  door  to  a  more  perfect  union  was 
through  war.  Ense  petit  placidam.  And  so 
when  the  House  resumed,  on  Jan.  29,  1861, 
the  consideration  of  the  report  of  the  special 
committee  of  thirty-three,  Mr.  Stevens  took  the 


102 


THADDEUS  STEVENS. 


first  opportunity  to  address  the  House.  He 
was  the  leader  of  the  Republicans.  It  was  a 
sad  hour.  "  Will  the  Union  go  to  pieces  ?  "  men 
asked  with  pale  lips.  Statesmen  of  renown 
knew  not  what  position  to  take.  All  were  at 
sea.  It  was  therefore  with  the  greatest  interest 
that  men  listened  to  what  the  great  commoner 
had  to  say.  "The  hour's  come,  likewise  the 
man."  The  curtain  rose  upon  the  grandest 
drama  the  world  had  ever  witnessed.  The 
grim,  iron-willed  man  stepped  forward  to  do 
his  appointed  work.  Amidst  many  illustrious 
men  he  was  the  most  striking  figure  of  them  all. 
He  had  no  doubt.  He  did  not  know  fear. 
Like  Carlyle's  Mirabeau,  he  had  swallowed  all 
formulas.  He  seized  the  opportunity  to  hew 
out  America's  giant  curse,  and  those  rigid  lips 
never  relaxed  while  he  thought  a  single  root  or 
branch  retained  vitality. 

He  spoke  in  no  uncertain  tones.  After  apolo 
gizing  for  the  poor  state  of  his  health,  which 
would  prevent  his  voice  being  heard  in 
all  parts  of  the  hall,  he  announced  his  belief 
that  there  could  be  no  compromise,  in  these 
words  :  "  I  regret,  sir,  that  I  am  com 
pelled  to  concur  in  the  belief  stated  yesterday 
by  the  gentleman  from  Virginia  [Mr.  Pryor], 
that  no  compromise  which  can  be  made  will 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  103 

have  any  effect  in  averting  the  present  difficulty. 
I  concur  in  that  belief  because  it  is  my  belief, 
although  I  regret  the  fact ;  for  when  I  see  these 
States  in  open  and  declared  rebellion  against 
the  Union,  seizing  upon  her  public  forts  and 
arsenals,  and  robbing  her  of  millions  of  the 
public  property ;  when  I  see  the  batteries  of 
seceding  States  blockading  the  highway  of  the 
nation,  and  their  armies  in  battle  array  against 
the  flag  of  the  Union ;  when  I  see,  Sir,  our  flag 
insulted,  and  that  insult  submitted  to,  I  have  no 
hope  that  concession,  humiliation  and  compro 
mise  can  have  any  effect  whatever  .  .  .  Vir 
ginia  sends  ambassadors  to  the  head  and  front 
of  the  empire  that  is  proposed  to  be  erected 
upon  the  ruins  of  this  government,  for  the 
purpose  of  getting  South  Carolina  to  appoint 
commissioners  for  the  purpose  of  proposing 
amendments  to  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States,  to  secure  their  rights,  as  they  say ;  and 
that  kingdom  of  South  Carolina  peremptorily 
refuses  to  appoint  any  such  commissioners,  for 
the  reason  that  it  has  no  desire  or  design  of 
promoting  the  ultimate  object  set  forth  in  the 
joint  resolutions  of  the  State  of  Virginia  —  that 
is  the  procurement  of  amendments  to,  or  new 
guarantees  in,  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States.  Thus  ends  negotiation  ;  thus  ends  con- 


104  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

cession ;  thus  ends  compromise,  by  the  solemn 
declaration  of  the  seceding  party  that  they  will 
not  listen  to  concession  or  compromise." 

Regarding  the  resolution  of  the  General 
Assembly  of  South  Carolina,  declaring  that 
the  separation  of  that  State  from  the  Federal 
Union  is  final,  he  said  :  — 

"  The  question  of  the  dissolution  of  the  Union 
is  a  grave  one,  and  should  be  approached  with 
out  excitement,  or  passion,  or  fear.  Homilies 
upon  the  Union,  and  jeremiads  over  its  destruc 
tion,  can  be  of  no  use,  except  to  display  fine 
rhetoric  and  pathetic  eloquence.  The  Southern 
States  will  not  be  turned  from  their  deliberate 
and  stern  purpose  by  soft  words  and  touching 
lamentations.  After  the  extent  to  which  they 
have  gone,  it  would  do  them  no  credit ;  con 
demnation,  which  is  now  felt  for  their  conduct, 
would  degenerate  into  contempt."  Pie  ridiculed 
the  idea  of  the  right  of  secession ;  claimed  the 
nation  was  one  people,  and  that  the  government 
had  the  power,  authority,  and  right  (nay,  it 
was  its  duty  !)  to  coerce  obedience  and  to  treat 
the  plotters  of  disunion  as  traitors.  "  I  would 
certainly  not  advise  the  shedding  of  American 
blood,  except  as  a  last  resort.  If  it  should 
become  necessary,  I  see  no  difficulty,  with  the 
ordinary  forces  of  the  United  States,  to  dissi- 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  105 

pate  the  rebels,  whether  of  high  or  low  degree." 
He  depicted  the  weakness  of  a  Southern  con 
federation  ;  showed  the  puerility  of  South  Caro 
lina  constructing  a  navy,  and  then,  while  urging 
peace,  declared  it  must  not  be  purchased  by 
dishonorable  concessions.  "  Let  there  be  no 
bloodshed  until  the  last  moment ;  but  let  no 
cowardly  counsels  unnerve  the  people ;  and 
then,  at  last,  if  needs  be,  let  every  one  be  ready 
to  gird  on  his  armor,  and  do  his  duty.  Sir,  I 
am  reminded  that  is  not  the  language  of  Penn 
sylvania,  as  represented  by  the  united  voices  of 
her  two  Senators.  I  know  it  is  not.  But  I  do 
not  believe  that  either  of  them  represented  the 
principles  of  any  considerable  portion  of  the 
people  of  that  State.  While  Pennsylvania 
would  go,  as  I  would,  to  the  verge  of  the  Con 
stitution  and  of  her  principles,  to  maintain 
peace,  I  believe  it  is  a  libel  on  the  good  name 
of  her  virtuous  people  to  say  that  she  would 
sacrifice  her  principles  to  obtain  the  favor  of 
rebels.  I  believe  it  to  be  a  libel  on  her  man 
hood  to  say  that  she  will  purchase  peace  by 
unprincipled  concessions  to  insurgents  with 
arms  in  their  hands.  If  I  thought  such  was  her 
character  I  would  expatriate  myself.  I  would 
leave  the  land  where  I  have  spent  my  life  from 
early  manhood  to  declining  age,  and  would  seek 


106  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

some  spot  untainted  by  the  coward  breath  of 
servility  and  meanness.  To  her  pleasant  valleys 
I  would  prefer  the  rugged,  bold  State  of  my 
nativity  [Vermont]  ;  nay,  any  spot  in  the  most 
barren  Arctic  region,  amid  whose  pure  icicles 
dwells  manly  freedom."  The  North  had  spoken 
by  the  lips  of  her  bravest  son.  Yes,  she  would 
wait  long  before  shedding  blood  ;  but  if  it  must 
come  to  that,  she  would  accept  the  issue  rather 
than  yield  one  inch  of  principle.  Well  might 
Mr.  Phillips  say  of  the  Yankee,  "he  is  slow  to 
fight,  but  he  fights  but  once."  The  Thirty-sixth 
Congress  found  the  country  in  an  excited,  fever 
ish  condition.  It  left  it  pierced  by  treason, 
broken  by  disunion,  distracted,  poor,  defence 
less.  When  Abraham  Lincoln  entered  upon 
his  duties  he  found  but  few  assets  on  which 
to  administer.  No  man  better  described  the 
shameful  condition  in  which  the  country's  prop 
erty  wras  left  by  the  Democratic  party  than 
did  Zach.  Chandler  in  his  speech  on  the  Pension 
bill.  wMr.  Jefferson  Davis  came  from  the 
Cabinet  of  Franklin  Pierce  into  the  Senate 
of  the  United  States,  and  took  the  oath 
with  me  to  be  faithful  to  this  government. 
During  four  years  I  sat  in  this  body  with  Mr. 
Jefferson  Davis,  and  saw  the  preparations  going 
on  from  day  to  day  for  the  overthrow  of  this 


TIIADDEUS  STEVENS.  107 

government.  With  treason  in  his  heart  and 
perjury  upon  his  lips  he  took  the  oath  to  sus 
tain  the  government  that  he  meant  to  over 
throw. 

"  Sir,  there  was  method  in  that  madness.  He, 
in  co-operation  with  other  men  from  his  section 
and  in  the  Cabinet  of  Mr.  Buchanan,  made  care 
ful  preparation  for  the  event  that  was  to  follow. 
Your  armies  were  scattered  all  over  the  broad 
land,  where  they  could  not  be  used  in  an 
emergency  ;  your  fleets  were  scattered  wherever 
the  winds  blew  and  water  was  found  to  float 
them,  where  they  could  not  be  used  to  put  down 
the  rebellion  ;  your  treasury  wTas  depleted  until 
your  bonds  bearing  six  per  cent,  principal  and 
interest  payable  in  coin,  were  sold  for  eighty- 
eight  cents  on  the  dollar  for  current  expenses  and 
no  buyers.  Preparations  were  carefully  made. 
Your  arms  were  sold  under  an  apparently  inno 
cent  clause  in  an  army  bill  providing  that  the 
Secretary  of  War  might,  at  his  discretion,  sell 
such  arms  as  he  deemed  it  for  the  interest  of 
the  government  to  sell."  f  Mr.  Stevens  once 
described  the  action  of  Buchanan's  Cabinet  as 
follows :  "  They  transferred  most  of  the  best 
weapons  of  war  from  the  North,  where  they  were 
manufactured,  to  the  South,  where  they  could 
be  readily  seized.  They  plunged  the  nation 


108  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

into  a  heavy  debt  in  time  of  peace.  When  the 
treasury  was  bare  of  cash,  they  robbed  it  of 
millions  of  bonds  and  whatever  else  they  could 
lay  their  hands  on.  They  fastened  upon  us  an 
incipient  free-trade  system,  which  impaired  our 
revenue,  paralyzed  our  national  industry,  and 
compelled  the  exportation  of  our  immense  pro 
duction  of  gold.  They  had  reduced  our  navy 
to  an  unserviceable  condition,  or  dispersed  it  to 
the  farthest  ocean.  Our  little  army  was  on  the 
Pacific  coast,  sequestered  in  Utah,  or  defending 
the  Southern  States  from  their  own  Indians." 
With  the  country  in  that  condition  it  was  evident 
that  the  real  ruler  of  the  nation  must  be  the 
Chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Ways  and  Means 
on  the  part  of  the  House. 

With  the  Thirty-seventh  Congress,  Thaddeus 
Stevens  began  his  undisputed  rule  of  the  country 
as  the  Chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Ways  and 
Means.  Few  men  have  ruled  over  an  empire  like 
the  one  he  controlled.  (He  held,  as  it  were,  the 
destinies  of  a  nation  in  his  hand.  He  directed 
the  spirit  of  the  war  in  the  halls  of  Congress. 
Men  yielded  to  him  even  when  they  believed 
him  wrong.  The  power  of  bringing  men  to  his 
side,  of  submitting  them  to  him,  he  possessed 
in  a  remarkable  degree.  But  deeper  than  all  that 
was  the  man's  reality  which  made  him  a  cloud 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  109 

by  day,  a  pillar  of  fire  by  night. !  There  was  no 
sham  about  him.  No  cant.  He  believed  in 
something  ;  was  in  earnest ;  was  real ;  and  men 
trusted  him,  not  wholly  feared  him,  nay,  at  heart 
they  loved  and  admired  him.  He  stood  for 
something.  He  had  an  object  in  view,  and  he 
pursued  it  relentlessly  to  the  end  —  the  equality 
of  all  men  before  the  law.  He  meant  fight,  too, 
if  it  was  necessary.  He  wras  the  opposite  of 
Seward,  who  was  the  orator  of  the  party.  Mr. 
Seward  had  immense  faith  in  the  Union  ;  laughed 
at  disunion ;  thought  the  wrar  could  not  last 
sixty  days  at  the  most ;  told  everybody  so  ; 
was  buoyant  and  spring-like ;  chipper  as  the 
lark.  "What  do  you  think,  now?"  said  Jerry 
Black  to  Seward,  after  the  Union  cause  had  met 
with  its  most  serious  disasters  during  the  war, 
and  despair  was  casting  its  deepest  shadows. 
"Why,"  said  Mr.  Seward,  "I  think,  as  I  have 
always  thought,  that  the  Union  will  be  saved." 
"Well,"  said  the  ex- Attorney-General,  "you  are 
the  most  sanguine  man  I  ever  saw."  "Not 
unreasonably  so,"  said  Mr.  Seward.  "What 
would  you  say  if  you  were  to  see  a  man  with 
pains  in  his  back,  fever  in  his  pulse,  and  his 
skin  covered  with  eruptions ? "  "I  should  say 
he  had  the  small-pox  and  would  die,"  said  Mr. 
Black.  "I  should  not,"  said  Mr.  Seward;  "I 


110  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

should  say  he  would  live,  for  in  such  cases  it  is 
the  rule  to  live,  and  the  exception  to  die." 

Stevens  looked  at  facts.  He  took  no  chances  ; 
did  not  speculate  on  events.  He  did  what 
had  to  be  done,  —  never  was  weak  or  literary. 
He  did  something.  He  knew  the  war,  which 
w^as  the  result  of  seventy  years'  crime,  was 
something  more  than  a  midnight  insurrection, 
and  with  energy  he  devoted  himself  to  the 
increasing  of  the  army,  to  the  passage  of  appro 
priations  large  enough  to  maintain  the  power  of 
the  government  and  strengthen  the  hands  of  the 
Executive.  As  early  as  July  24,  1861,  in  reply 
to  Mr.  Colfax,  he  said  :  — 

"Now,  the  gentleman  does  not  expect,  I  sup 
pose,  that  this  war  is  only  to  last  for  a  few 
months,  and  that  we  will  not  need  this  money. 
He  does  not  expect  it  will  cease  of  itself.  I 
look  upon  it,  as  I  have  looked  upon  it  ever 
since  these  States  went  deliberately  into  treason, 
as  one  which  will  be  a  protracted  and  bloody 
war.  Some  gentlemen  have  an  idea  that  our 

o 

enemies,  being  rebels,  will  surrender  —  will 
succumb  in  the  course  of  a  few  months,  and 
with  little  expense,  and  that  they  will  not  fight 
what  they  have  undertaken.  I  flatter  myself 
with  no  such  hope.  I  believe  that  the  battles 
which  are  to  be  fought  are  to  be  desperate  and 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  Ill 

bloody  battles,  and  that  they  are  to  be 
numerous.  I  believe  that  many  thousand  val 
uable  lives  will  be  lost,  and  that  millions  of 
money  will  be  expended.  The  only  question  is, 
whether  this  government  is  prepared  to  meet 
all  these  perils,  and  to  overcome  them.  If 
they  are,  they  must  submit  to  taxes  which  are 
burdensome :  which  the  people,  I  know,  at 
any  other  time,  would  not  submit  to  for  a 
moment,  but  which  I  believe  they  will  now  sub 
mit  to."  Did  not  history  justify  Mr.  Stevens's 
prediction  ?  What  litter  hand  was  there  to  pro 
vide  the  means  of  maintaining  the  war?  One 
of  the  peculiar  incidents  of  the  heroic  epoch  was 
the  manner  in  which  the  lawyers  stuck  to  tech 
nicalities.  They  were  always  crying  out,  "It 
is  not  in  the  Constitution." 

No  man  ever  disposed  of  such  nonsense  better 
than  did  the  commoner  in  the  debate  on  the 
Confiscation  bill.  "  We  are  told,"  said  he,  "  that 
because  the  Constitution  does  not  allow  us  to 
confiscate  a  certain  species  of  property,  there 
fore  we  cannot  liberate  slaves.  Mr.  Speaker,  I 
thought  the  time  had  come  when  the  laws  of 
war  were  to  govern  our  action ;  when  Consti 
tutions,  if  they  stood  in  the  way  of  the  laws 
of  war,  in  dealing  with  the  enemy,  had  no  right 
to  interfere.  Who  pleads  the  Constitution 


112  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

against  our  action?  Who  says  the  Constitution 
must  come  in  bar  of  our  action?  It  is  the 
advocates  of  rebels,  of  rebels  who  have  sought 
to  overthrow  the  Constitution  and  trample  it  in 
the  dust,  who  repudiate  the  Constitution.  Sir, 
these  rebels,  who  have  disregarded  and  set  at 
defiance  that  instrument  are,  by  every  rule  of 
municipal  and  international  law,  estopped  from 
pleading  it  against  our  action.  The  law  estab 
lished  in  the  days  of  Cicero  —  Inter  arma  silent 
leges  —  is  a  law  that  has  been  in  force  down  to 
the  present  time ;  and  any  nation  which  disre 
gards  that  law  is  a  poor,  pusillanimous  nation, 
which  submits  its  neck  to  be  struck  off  by 
the  enemy."  Now  such  direct  language  as 
that  is  refreshing.  It  is  cathartic.  It  puri 
fies  the  whole  system.  It  is  of  far  greater 
import  than  had  it  been  wrought  into  heavy- 
sounding,  phlegmatic  periods, or  gracefully  inlaid 
with  the  scattered  thoughts  of  carpet  knights, 
while  the  views  expressed  are  far  truer  than  the 
doubts  of  hesitating  lawyers,  "letting  I  dare 
not  wait  upon  I  would."  But  the  best  of 
it  is  yet  to  come.  In  referring  to  the  slaves 
and  their  freedom,  he  believed  the  government 
had  power  to  and  could  free  the  blacks.  "  But  it 
is  said  the  South  will  never  submit  —  that  we 
cannot  conquer  the  rebels  —  that  they  will  suffer 


THADDEUS  STEVEN'S.  113 

themselves  to  be  slaughtered,  and  their  whole 
country  to  be  laid  waste.  /  Sir,  war  is  a  griev 
ous  thing  at  best,  and  civil  war  more  than  any 
other ;  but  if  they  hold  this  language,  and  the 
means  which  they  have  suggested  must  be 
resorted  to ;  if  their  whole  country  must  be 
laid  waste  and  made  a  desert,  in  order  to  save 
this  Union  from  destruction,  so  let  it  be.  I 
would  rather,  Sir,  reduce  them  to  a  condition 
where  their  whole  country  is  to  be  re-peopled 
by  a  band  of  freemen,  than  to  see  them  perpe 
trate  the  destruction  of  this  people  through  our 
agency.  I  do  not  say  it  is  time  to  resort  to 
such  means,  and  I  do  not  say  that  the  time  will 
come,  but  I  never  fear  to  express  my  senti 
ments.  It  is  not  a  question  with  me  of  policy, 
but  a  question  of  principle.  If  this  war  is  con 
tinued  long,  and  is  bloody,  I  do  not  believe  that 
the  free  people  of  the  North  will  stand  by  and 
see  their  sons  and  brothers  and  neighbors 
slaughtered  by  thousands  and  tens  of  thousands 
by  rebels,  with  arms  in  their  hands,  and  forbear 
to  call  upon  their  enemies  to  be  our  friends, 
and  to  help  us  in  subduing  them.  I,  for  one,  if 
it  continues  long,  and  has  the  consequences 
mentioned,  shall  be  ready  to  go  for  it,  let  it 
horrify  the  gentleman  from  New  York,  or  any 
body  else.  That  is  my  doctrine,  and  that  will 


114  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

be  the  doctrine  of  the  whole  free  people  of  the 
North,  before  two  years  roll  round,  if  this  war 
continues. 

"  As  to  the  end  of  the  war,  until  the  rebels  are 
subdued,  no  man  in  the  North  thinks  of  it. 
If  the  government  are  equal  to  the  people,  and 
believe  they  are,  there  will  be  no  bargaining, 
there  will  be  no  negotiation,  there  will  be  no 
truces  with  the  rebels,  except  to  bury  the  dead, 
until  every  man  shall  have  laid  down  his  amis, 
disbanded  his  organization,  submitted  himself 
to  the  government,  and  sued  for  mercy.  And, 
Sir,  if  those  who  have  the  control  of  the  gov 
ernment  are  not  fit  for  this  task,  and  have  not 
the  nerve  and  mind  for  it,  the  people  will  take 
care  that  there  are  others  who  are  —  although, 
Sir,  I  have  not  a  bit  of  fear  of  the  present 
administration,  or  the  present  Executive. 

"  I  have  spoken  more  freely,  perhaps,  than 
gentlemen  within  my  hearing  might  think  poli 
tic,  but  I  have  spoken  just  what  I  felt.  I  have 
spoken  what  I  believe  will  be  the  result ;  and 
I  warn  Southern  gentlemen,  that  if  this  war 
is  to  continue,  there  will  be  a  time  when  my 
friend  from  New  York  will  see  it  declared 
by  this  free  nation,  that  every  bondman  in  the 
South  belonging  to  a  rebel — recollect,  I  con 
fine  it  to  them  —  shall  be  called  upon  to  aid  us 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  115 

in  war  against  their   masters,    and   to   restore 
this  Union." 

Thus  early  did  he  foresee  what  the  logic  of 
events  would  produce.  None  saw  so  soon,  so 
clearly,  what  the  result  of  the  war  must  be. 
None  knew  better  than  he  the  Southern  character 
and  temperament.  He  perceived  the  only  way 
to  win  was  to  strike  decisive  blows.  He  knew 
the  most  lethal  weapon  was  to  free  and  arm  the 
slaves,  and  as  early  as  the  first  day  of  the  second 
session  of  the  Thirty-seventh  Congress  (Dec. 
2,  1861),  he  introduced  a  bill  to  emancipate  the 
slaves.  The  world  thought  the  war  on  the  part 
of  the  North  was  a  struggle  to  perpetuate  the 
Union.  Stevens  understood  the  signs  of  the 
time  better  than  that.  He  knew  the  result  of 
the  war  was  freedom.  On  Jan.  22,  1862, 
he  had  an  opportunity  to  declare  his  views  on 
that  point.  tf  This  is  no  accidental  rebellion," 
said  he.  "  We  are  in  the  midst  of  a  crisis  which 
a  sagacious  statesman  foretold  thirty  years  ago, 
before  the  agitation  existed.  The  rebels  are 
proud,  haughty,  and  obstinate.  Their  training 
has  led  them  to  believe  that  they  are  born  to 
command.  They  will  suffer  disastrous  defeat 
before  their  pride  is  humbled.  They  have  a 
vast  country  to  overrun.  They  declare  they 
will  suffer  it  to  become  a  smoking  ruin  before 


116  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

they  will  submit.  That  issue  must  be  accepted. 
Better  lay  their  whole  country  waste  than  suffer 
the  nation  to  be  murdered.  Better  depopulate 
them,  and  plant  a  new  race  of  freemen  on  their 
desolated  and  deserted  fields,  than  suffer  rebellion 
to  triumph.  Such  is  the  voice  of  the  free  people 
of  the  North.  If  our  rulers  prove  equal  to  the 
wishes  of  the  people,  there  will  be  no  negotia 
tion,  no  parley,  no  truce,  until  every  rebel 
shall  have  laid  down  his  arms,  disbanded  his 
organization,  and  submitted  to  the  government. 
The  people  are  humane  and  this  is  humanity. 

"  How,  then,  and  when  will  this  war  end  ?  In 
other  words,  how  can  the  South  be  wholly 
exhausted?  Let  us  not  be  deceived.  Those 
who  talk  about  peace  in  sixty  days  are  shallow 
statesmen.  When,  I  again  ask,  will  this  war 
be  ended  ?  I  can  venture  to  answer  that  it  will 
not  end  until  the  government  shall  more  fully 
comprehend  the  magnitude  of  the  crisis ;  until 
they  have  discovered  that  this  is  an  internecino 
war  in  which  one  party  or  the  other  must  be 
reduced  to  hopeless  feebleness,  and  the  power  of 
further  effort  shall  be  utterly  annihilated.  You 
must  adopt  a  new  mode  of  warfare.  You  may 
raise  larger  armies ;  you  may  gain  battle  after 
battle ;  you  may  overrun  much  of  their  terri 
tory  :  you  cannot  hold  it.  Their  soldiers  are  as 


TIIADDEUS   STEVENS.  117 

brave  as  yours.  So  long  as  they  are  left  the 
means  of  cultivating  their  fields  through  forced 
labor,  you  may  expend  the  blood  of  tens  of 
thousands  of  freemen,  and  billions  of  money, 
year  after  year,  without  being  any  nearer  the  end. 
Their  domestic  institutions  give  them  great 
advantage  over  the  free  States  in  time  of  war. 
They  need  not,  and  they  do  not,  withdraw  a 
single  hand  from  the  cultivation  of  the  soil. 
Their  freemen  never  labor.  Every  able-bodied 
man  can  be  spared  for  the  army.  Although  the 
black  man  never  lifts  a  weapon,  he  is  really  the 
mainstay  of  the  war. 

"And  now,  pray,  which  is  most  to  be 
abhorred,  a  rebellion  of  slaves  fighting  for  their 
liberty,  or  a  rebellion  of  freemen  fighting  to 
murder  the  nation?  Which  seems  to  you  the 
most  cruel,  calling  on  bondsmen  to  quell  the 
insurrection,  or  shooting  down  their  masters  to 
effect  the  same  object?  You  send  forth  your 
sons  and  brothers  to  shoot  and  sabre  and  bayonet 
the  insurgents,  but  you  hesitate  to  break  the 
bonds  of  their  slaves  to  reach  the  same  end. 
What  puerile  inconsistency ! 

"  Self-preservation  is  our  first  duty.  And  in 
a  just  war  we  have  a  right  to  put  in  practice 
against  the  enemy  every  measure  that  is  neces 
sary  to  weaken  him  and  disable  him  from 


118  .        THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

resisting  us  and  supporting  injustice.  The  slave 
is  in  a  state  of  war  with  his  master.  Why  not 
employ  the  enemy  of  our  enemy  to  weaken  his 
power  ? 

"The  occasion  is  forced  upon  us,  and  the 
invitation  presented  to  strike  the  chain  from  four 
millions  of  human  beings,  and  create  them 
men;  to  extinguish  slavery  on  this  whole  con 
tinent  ;  to  wipe  out,  so  far  as  we  are  concerned, 
the  most  hateful  and  infernal  blot  that  ever 
disgraced  the  escutcheon  of  man ;  to  write  a 
page  in  the  history  of  the  world  whose  bright 
ness  shall  eclipse  all  the  records  of  heroes  and 
of  sages." 

He  spoke  the  truth,  but,  Cassandra-like,  was 
not  believed.  He  was  ahead  of  his  party  and 
his  time.  When  the  repeal  of  the  corn  laws 
came  about  under  the  Protectionist,  Peel,  peo 
ple  said,  "  Ah  !  the  famine  forces  Peel's  hand." 
So  with  Lincoln  and  emancipation.  It  was  only 
when  the  invaders  rushed  into  Maryland  and 
;were  almost  at  the  doors  of  the  Capitol  that  he 
took  his  oath  to  liberate  the  blacks.  Not  till 
then.  But  the  battle  had  been  fought  for  him 
by  Stevens  in  the  House,  and  it  required  only 
the  fear  and  terror  of  an  invasion  to  force 
Lincoln's  hand.  At  the  beginning  of  the  year 
1862,  the  whole  Union  army  amounted  to  more 


THADDEUS   STEVENS.  119 

than  five  hundred  thousand  men.  The  second 
session  of  the  Thirty-seventh  Congress  ended 
July  17,  1862.  Important  military  events  had 
taken  place  during  its  continuance  —  the  battle 
of  Fair  Oaks,  the  Seven  Days'  battle  of  the 
Peninsula,  Malvern  Hill,  the  contest  between 
the  Monitor  and  Merrimac,  the  fall  of  Forts 
Henry  and  Donelson,  the  battle  of  Pittsburg 
Landing  and  the  capture  of  New  Orleans,  were 
among  the  most  noted. 

But  before  that  Congress  assembled  for  its 
third  session,  one  of  the  most  important  events 
of  Lincoln's  administration  took  place.  Sept. 
22,  1862,  the  President  issued  the  following 
proclamation :  — 

"That,  on  the  first  day  of  January,  in  the 
year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  eight  hundred 
and  sixty-three,  all  persons  held  as  slaves  within 
any  State,  or  designated  part  of  a  State,  the 
people  whereof  shall  then  be  in  rebellion  against 
the  United  States,  shall  be  then,  thenceforth, 
and  forever  free  ;  and  the  Executive  Government 
of  the  United  States,  including  the  military  and 
naval  authority  thereof,  will  recognize  and 
maintain  the  freedom  of  such  persons,  and  will 
do  no  act  or  acts  to  repress  such  persons,  or 
any  of  them,  in  any  effort  they  may  make  for 
their  actual  freedom." 


120  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

In  his  message  to  Congress,  when  it  assembled 
Dec.  1,  1862,  the  President  explained  the 
proclamation  by  showing  that  in  giving  freedom 
to  the  slave  we  assure  freedom  to  the  free, 
honorable  alike  in  what  we  give  and  what  we 
preserve.  The  way  he  claimed  was  plain, 
peaceable,  glorious,  just  —  a  way  which,  if 
followed,  the  world  would  ever  applaud,  and 
God  would  forever  bless. 

It  may  seem  to  some  that  at  times  Mr.  Stevens 
disregarded  rules  and  usages  in  order  to  accom 
plish  his  purposes  ;  that  with  him  the  end  justified 
the  means  ;  that  he  acted  arbitrarily  ;  put  aside 
the  plain  postulates  of  the  Constitution,  and 
hurried  on  to  the  goal.  Not  so.  In  fact,  the 
opposite  was  the  truth.  No  man  believed  in 
the  Constitution  and  laws  more  than  he.  No 
one  followed  them  more  closely  in  cases  where 
they  should  be  followed.  Before  the  war,  he 
always  held  himself  bound  by  the  compromises 
of  the  Constitution,  though  he  disputed  the 
wisdom  of  many  of  them.  When  the  war  came 
he  asserted  that  the  Constitution  never  was 
framed  with  the  view  of  a  civil  war,  and  that 
least  of  all  could  those  who  had  thrown  it  off 
claim  its  protection.  And  he  sneered  at  those 
who  were  afraid  to  step  outside  of  the  Constitu 
tion  in  time  of  war,  but  tried  to  cover  their 


Til  AD  DE  US  STEVENS.  121 

policy  by  twisting  the  great  charter.  His 
position  is  well  defined  in  the  debate  on  the 
admission  of  West  Virginia. 

The  Constitution  provided  that  no  new  State 
shall  be  formed  or  erected  within  the  jurisdic 
tions  of  any  other  State,  nor  any  State  be  formed 
by  the  junction  of  two  or  more  States,  or  parts 
of  States  without  the  consent  of  the  Legislatures 
of  the  States  concerned,  as  well  as  of  the  Con 
gress. 

Mr.  Stevens  voted  for  the  admission  of  the 
new  State  but  took  occasion  to  put  on  record  an 
explanation  of  his  vote.  "  By  the  Constitution, 
a  State  may  be  divided  by  the  consent  of  the 
Legislature  thereof,  and  by  the  consent  of  Con 
gress  admitting  the  new  State  into  the  Union. 
Now,  Sir,  it  is  but  mockery,  in  my  judgment,  to 
tell  me  that  the  Legislature  of  Virginia  has  ever 
consented  to  this  division.  There  are  two  hun 
dred  thousand,  out  of  a  million  and  a  quarter  of 
people,  who  have  participated  in  this  proceed 
ing.  They  have  held  a  convention,  and  they 
have  elected  a  Legislature  in  pursuance  of  a  de 
cree  of  that  convention.  Before  all  this  was 
done  the  State  had  a  regular  organization,  a  Con 
stitution  under  which  that  corporation  acted. 
By  a  convention  of  a  very  large  majority  of  the 
people  of  that  State,  they  changed  their  Consti- 


122  TIIADDEUS  STEVENS. 

tution,  and  changed  their  relations  to  the  Fed 
eral  Government  from  that  of  one  of  its  mem 
bers  to  that  of  secession  from  it.  Now,  I  need 
not  be  told  that  that  is  treason.  I  know  it. 
And  it  is  treason  in  all  the  individuals  that 
participated  in  it.  But  so  far  as  the  State  muni 
cipality  or  corporation  was  concerned,  it  was  a 
valid  act  and  governed  the  State.  Our  Govern 
ment  does  not  act  upon  the  State.  The  State,  as 
a  separate  and  distinct  body,  was  the  State  of  a 
majority  of  the  people  of  Virginia,  whether 
rebel  or  loyal,  whether  convicts  or  freemen. 
The  majority  of  the  people  of  Virginia  was  the 
State  of  Virginia,  although  individuals  had  com 
mitted  treason.  The  State  of  Virginia  has  never 
given  her  assent  to  the  separation.  Now,  then, 
these  seceding  States  have  declared  that  they 
are  no  longer  members  of  the  Union  —  they 
have  raised  an  army  and  a  power  which  the 
governments  of  Europe  have  recognized  as  a 
belligerent  power.  We  ourselves,  by  what  I 
consider  a  most  unfortunate  act,  not  well  con 
sidered  —  declaring  a  blockade  of  their  ports  — 
have  acknowledged  them  as  a  power.  We  can 
not  blockade  our  own  ports.  It  is  an  absurdity. 
We  blockade  an  enemy's  ports.  Declaring  a 
blockade  is  admitting  the  power  of  those  you 
blockade.  We  should  have  repealed  the  law 


TEA  DDE  US  STEVENS.  123 

creating  those  ports  of  entry,  and  thus  stopping 
their  intercourse  with  the  world.  If  we  had  re 
pealed  the  laws  making  them  ports  of  entry, 
there  would  have  been  no  need  of  a  blockade. 
No  nation  would  have  had  a  right  to  send  ves 
sels  there  even  though  we  might  not  have  had  a 
ship  of  war  within  a  hundred  miles. 

"Now  then,  Sir,  these  rebellious  States  being  a 
power,  by  the  acknowledgment  of  European 
nations  and  of  our  own  nation,  subject  and  en 
titled  to  belligerent  rights,  they  become  subject 
to  the  rules  of  war,  and  the  Constitution  has  no 
longer  the  least  effect  upon  them. 

"I  say,  then,  we  may  admit  West  Virginia  as 
a  new  State,  not  by  virtue  of  any  provision  in  the 
Constitution,  but  under  the  absolute  power 
which  the  laws  of  war  give  us  under  the  circum 
stances  in  which  we  are  placed.  I  shall  vote 
for  this  bill  upon  that  theory,  and  upon  that 
alone ;  for  I  will  not  stultify  myself  by  sup 
posing  that  we  have  any  warrant  in  the  Consti 
tution  for  this  proceeding." 

In  all  these  speeches  one  cannot  help  noticing 
how  honest  and  open  the  man  is.  He  always 
places  himself  on  the  undisputed  fact.  He  does 
not  try  to  find  authorities  or  excuses  for  his 
action.  He  does  not  need  them.  He  is  a  hero 
carrying  on  a  great  war.  His  own  personal 


124  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

prowess  will  carry  him  through,  when  treatises 
on  engineering  would  fail.  Being  a  hero  he 
speaks  the  truth.  See  how  impregnable  were 
the  positions  he  took  during  those  stormy  days. 
^  (Thirst,  there  should  be  no  compromise  with 
traitors.  Second,  there  could  be  no  peaceable 
solution  of  the  great  problem,  war  was  inevita 
ble.  Third,  it  was  the  duty  of  the  government 
to  put  down  the  rebellion  and  coerce  the  rebels. 
Fourth,  that  of  necessity  the  war  must  be  long 
and  bloody.  Fifth,  that  in  a  state  of  war  the 
rebellious  States  could  not  claim  the  protection 
of  a  Constitution  they  had  forsworn.  Sixth, 
that  therefore  confiscation  was  a  duty,  and 
emancipation  just.  Seventh,  that  we  had  fool 
ishly  acknowledged  the  South  as  a  belligerent 
power,  and  therefore  she  must  be  subdued  like 
any  foreign  enemy.  Now  the  truth  of  all  these 
propositions  was  denied  by  statesmen  of  the 
Seward  stamp.  Suppose  Mr.  William  Henry 
Seward  had  been  Chairman  of  the  Ways  and 
Means  Committee,  where,  pray,  would  the  nation 
have  drifted?  Certainly  not  to  victory.  With 
any  other  man  in  Stevens's  place,  the  issue 
might  have  been  doubtful.  But  with  the  old 
hero  and  commoner  at  the  head,  victory  was 
assured.  Antagonized  on  all  sides  by  all  fac 
tions,  he  held  the  ship  of  State  true  to  her 


TH A  DDE  US  STEVENS.  125 

course.  In  a  great  war,  the  most  important 
battles  are  fought  not  in  the  field  but  in  the 
legislative  chamber.  The  greatest  general  is 
the  one  in  civil  life.  If  the  civil  power  be  cor 
rupt  or  weak  the  military  power  will  surely  fail. 
The  hero  of  Vicksburg,  Atlanta,  or  New  Or 
leans  may  be  no  more  important  a  figure  than 
the  leader  of  the  House.  His  battles  are  of  a 
different  kind,  but  equally  decisive.  With  the 
issuing  of  the  emancipation  proclamation  affairs 
took  a  fresh  start.  From  that  time  forth  victory 
seemed  to  turn  northward.  The  second  nomi 
nation  of  Lincoln,  his  triumphant  election  fol 
lowed  by  the  wonderful  second  inaugural  address 
showed  plainly  where  the  North  stood  and 
whither  tending.  Always  busied  about  the 
welfare  of  his  country  and  the  interests  of  his 
fellow-man,  never  ambitious  for  higher  office, 
the  commoner  paid  little  attention  in  informing 
people  what  his  purpose  in  life  was.  That  they 
could  judge  of  from  his  acts.  But  in  Jan.  1865, 
in  the  course  of  a  debate  with  Mr.  Pendleton 
he  announced  his  only  ambition  and  perhaps 
described  that  of  the  Ohio  statesman. 

"  So  far  as  the  appeals  of  the  learned  gentle 
man  [Mr.  Pendleton]  are  concerned,  in  his 
pathetic  winding  up,  I  will  be  willing  to  take 
my  chance,  when  we  all  moulder  in  the  dust. 


126  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

He  may  have  his  epitaph  written,  if  it  be  truly 
written  :  '  Here  rests  the  ablest  and  most  per 
tinacious  defender  of  slavery  and  opponent  of 
liberty.'  And  I  will  be  satisfied  if  my  epitaph 
shall  be  written  thus  :  f  Here  lies  one  who  never 
rose  to  any  eminence,  and  who  only  courted 
the  low  ambition  to  have  it  said  that  he  had 
striven  to  ameliorate  the  condition  of  the  poor, 
the  lowly,  the  down-trodden  of  every  race  and 
language  and  color.'  I  shall  be  content,  with 
such  an  eulogy  on  his  lofty  tomb,  and  such  an 
inscription  on  my  humble  grave,  to  trust  our 
memories  to  the  judgment  of  after  ages." 

But  times  change  verily.  For  now  this  "  per 
tinacious  defender  of  slavery  and  opponent  of 
liberty  "  poses  as  the  aesthetic  candidate  for  the 
Presidency  in  1884,  and  receives  the  applause 
of  the  independent  press  and  the  callow  youth 
of  the  nation.  O  temporal  O  mores! 

The  early  part  of  the  year  1865  was  filled 
with  much  discussion  as  regarded  peace  and  the 
propositions  of  the  rebel  commissioners.  Mr. 
Stevens  upheld  the  expressed  views  of  the 
President  on  that  point.  The  idea  of  a  Southern 
Confederacy,  acknowledged  by  the  North  as  the 
terms  of  peace,  was  extremely  distasteful  to 
him,  and  he  fiercely  combated  the  idea.  At 
that  time  he  showed  how  well  he  understood 


TH A  DDE  US  STEVENS.  127 

the  Southern  character,  for  he  foretold  the 
birth  of  the  Ku  Klux  and  guerilla  warfare, 
which  succeeded  the  end  of  the  war. 

On  April  14,  1865,  good,  careful  Abraham 
Lincoln  died  by  the  assassin's  hand.  A  man 
full  of  cares,  carrying  a  great  weight  of  respon 
sibility,  but  "happy  in  his  life,  fortunate  in  the 
opportunity  of  his  death."  Since  the  greatest 
of  Roman  writers  wrote  those  words  concerning 
Germanicus,  they  have  never  been  applied  to  a 
more  opportune  death.  He  lived  to  see  the 
Union  restored,  Richmond  taken,  Lee's  army 
surrendered,  slavery  at  an  end,  his  malignant 
opposers  silenced ;  then  he  died,  and  all  the 
bitterness  of  his  enemies  changed  to  silent 
respect  or  repentant  gratitude.  Rising  from  the 
humblest  position  in  the  nation  to  the  highest 
among  men,  he  ennobled  that  great  office  more 
than  the  office  ennobled  him.  But,  alas!  the 
man  that  was  to  take  his  place  was  a  being  of  a 
far  different  order;  one  who  belonged,  if  to 
any  era,  to  that  of  the  troglodytes.  At  the 
very  outset,  while  in  the  act  of  taking  the 
oath  of  office,  he  showed  himself  to  the  world 
in  a  state  of  beastly  intoxication.  It  shocked 
the  sensibilities  of  every  honest  man.  It  was 
a  peculiarly  sad  spectacle  to  Stevens,  who 
was  a  man  of  the  most  temperate  habits. 


128  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

And  here  let  me  rehearse  the  circumstance 
which  made  Mr.  Stevens  so  rigid  in  this  re 
gard  :  — 

While  he  was  engaged  in  his  profession  at 
Gettysburg,  he  was  a  member  of  a  sort  of  club 
of  congenial  spirits  who  were  accustomed  to 
meet  round  at  each  other's  houses  and  spend 
the  evening  in  playing  cards  and  drinking 
liquor.  One  evening,  one  of  the  party,  a  great 
favorite,  who  was  cashier  of  the  bank  in  Gettys 
burg,  becoming  a  little  inebriated,  was  escorted 
home  by  two  of  his  friends,  who  opened  the 
door  of  his  house  and  left  him  in  the  entry, 
supposing  he  would  find  his  way  up-stairs.  In 
the  morning,  when  his  wife  came  down,  she 
found  him  on  the  floor  —  dead !  When  Mr. 
Stevens  heard  of  it,  he  went  into  his  cellar 
with  a  hatchet,  broke  open  the  heads  of  his 
wine  and  whiskey  barrels,  and  would  never  taste 
anything  of  the  sort  afterwards.  When  he 
became  an  old  man  and  very  delicate,  his 
physician  prescribed  some  alcoholic  stimulus 
as  a  medicine.  He  absolutely  refused  to  touch 
it.  After  holding  out  for  several  days,  he  came 
to  the  doctor's  office  one  morning,  and  dragging 
himself  wearily  up  the  steps,  took  hold  of  each 
side  of  the  door  frame  to  draw  himself  into  the 
room.  On  his  complaining  of  great  prostration, 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  129 

the  doctor  told  him  frankly  that  he  must  either 
take  what  was  prescribed  or  die.  "  Then,"  said 
he,  "I'll  take  it." 

But  the  vice  of  intemperance  was  the  least  of 
the  new  President's  faults.  He  came  into  power 
at  a  most  dangerous  period,  —  the  time  when  a 
reaction  might  take  place,  and  all  that  the  war 
gained,  be  lost.  Heaven  and  history  only  know 
how  that  miserable  old  man  tried  to  produce 
such  a  reaction  and  turn  back  the  wheels  of 
time. 

Mr.  Stevens  recognized  that  liberty  had  a 
traitor  in  the  White  House,  and  that  the  battle 
for  freedom  was  only  half  won.  At  the  very 
opening  of  the  next  session  of  Congress,  Dec. 
4,  1865,  he  threw  down  the  gauntlet  to  the 
President  by  making  his  motion  for  a  special 
committee  on  reconstruction.  Many  thought  it 
unwise  ;  but  then  it  was  "  Old  Thad  "  that  did 
it,  and  they  kept  their  feelings  to  themselves. 
If  Mr.  Stevens  knew  how  to  conduct  the  war  so 
as  to  destroy  the  South,  he  knew  well  how  to 
reconstruct  that  country.  To  him,  more  than 
to  any  one  man,  we  owe  the  safeguards  which 
now  protect  the  black  and  prevent  the  slave 
holder  from  evading  the  results  of  the  war. 
Stevens  realized  that  there  must  be  no  reaction  ; 
that  every  door  must  be  closed  and  locked,  and 


130  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

that  the  future  would  depend  wholly  on  the  thor 
oughness  with  which  the  work  was  done  then. 
He  knew  the  mistake  of  our  ancestors  when, 
having  beheaded  Charles,  in  a  few  years  they 
allowed  the  hated  race  to  sit  upon  the  throne. 
No  such  experiment  as  that  was  to  be  made. 
If  we  could  not  have  indemnity  for  the  past,  we 
must  have  security  for  the  future.  If  the 
rebellious  States  were  to  come  back  into  the 
Union,  they  must  come  with  solemn  guarantees. 
And  to  this  work  —  all  for  others,  and  not  for 
himself — he  gave  his  dying  years. 

The  first  thing  to  do  was  to  prevent  the  new 
chief  magistrate  from  undoing  the  work  of  the 
war  ;  and  to  guard  against  this,  it  was  necessary 
for  Congress  to  reconstruct  the  South  rather 
than  trust  that  work  to  the  tender  mercies  of 
the  Border  State  President.  Mr.  Stevens, 
under  a  suspension  of  the  rules,  on  the  first  day 
of  the  first  session  of  the  Thirty-ninth  Congress, 
introduced  his  now  famous  reconstruction  reso 
lution.  It  ran  as  follows  :  — 

"Resolved,  That  a  joint  committee  of  fifteen 
members  shall  be  appointed,  nine  of  whom  shall 
be  members  of  the  House,  and  six  members  of 
the  Senate,  who  shall  inquire  into  the  condition 
of  the  States  which  formed  the  so-called  Con 
federate  States  of  America,  and  report  whether 


Til  A  DDE  US  STEVENS.  131 

they  or  any  of  them  are  entitled  to  he  repre 
sented  in  either  House  of  Congress,  with  leave 
to  report  at  any  time  hy  hill  or  otherwise  ;  and 
until  such  report  have  been  made  and  finally 
acted  upon  by  Congress,  no  member  shall  be 
received  into  either  House  from  any  of  the  said 
so-called  Confederate  States ;  and  all  papers 
relative  to  the  representation  of  the  said  States 
shall  be  referred  to  the  said  committee  without 
debate."  Of  that  committee  Mr.  Stevens  was 
chairman. 

Nothing  could  be  more  iron-clad  than  that. 
None  but  Stevens  could  have  drafted  such  a 
paper,  none  but  he  would  have  offered  it  to  the 
House.  But  there  was  work  to  do,  and  the 
President  must  be  checked  at  once.  The  Pres 
ident's  love  for  amnesty  was  not  fully  ap 
preciated  by  the  Republicans.  On  Dec.  18, 
Stevens  had  all  parts  of  the  President's  message 
relating  to  the  subject  of  reconstruction  referred 
to  the  joint  committee  on  reconstruction.  On 
this  occasion  he  made  a  very  solid  and  bril 
liant  speech  on  the  subject,  and  outlined 
strongly  his  views  as  to  the  way  in  which  the 
Southern  States  should  come  back  into  the 
Union  ;  and  wiser  than  many  of  his  associates, 
he  saw  the  necessity  of  negro  suffrage,  as  well 
as  its  justice.  And  in  this  fashion  did  he  pro- 


132  TIIADDEUS  STEVENS. 

claim  himself:  "Our  fathers  repudiated  the 
whole  doctrine  of  the  legal  superiority  of  fami 
lies  or  races,  and  proclaimed  the  equality  of 
men  before  the  law.  Upon  that  they  created  a 
revolution  and  gave  birth  to  the  Republic. 
They  were  prevented  by  slavery  from  perfect 
ing  the  superstructure  whose  foundation  they 
had  thus  broadly  laid.  For  the  sake  of  the 
Union  they  consented  to  wait,  but  never  relin 
quished  the  idea  of  its  final  completion.  The 
time  to  which  they  looked  forward  has  come. 
It  is  our  duty  to  complete  their  work.  If  this 
Republic  is  .not  now  made  to  stand  on  their 
great  principles,  it  has  no  honest  foundation, 
and  the  Father  of  all  men  will  shake  it  to  its 
centre.  If  we  have  not  yet  been  sufficiently 
scourged  for  our  national  sin,  to  teach  us  to  do 
justice  to  all  God's  creatures,  without  distinc 
tion  of  race  or  color,  we  must  expect  the  still 
more  heavy  vengeance  of  an  offended  Father, 
still  increasing  his  inflictions  as  he  increased  the 
severity  of  the  plagues  of  Egypt  until  the  tyrant 
consented  to  do  justice.  And  when  the  tyrant 
repented  of  his  reluctant  consent,  and  attempted 
to  enslave  the  people,  as  our  Southern  tyrants  are 
attempting  to  do  now,  he  filled  the  Red  Sea 
with  broken  chariots  and  drowned  horses,  and 
strewed  the  shores  with  dead  carcasses. 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  '  133 

"  This  is  not  a  '  white  man's  government '  in 
the  exclusive  sense  in  which  it  is  used.  To  say 
so,  is  political  blasphemy,  for  it  violates  the 
fundamental  principles  of  our  gospel  of  liberty. 
This  is  man's  government ;  the  government  of 
all  men  alike  ;  not  that  all  men  will  have  equal 
power  and  sway  within  it.  Accidental  circum 
stances,  natural  and  acquired  endowment  and 
ability,  will  vary  their  fortunes.  But  equal 
right  to  all  the  privileges  of  the  government  is 
innate  in  every  immortal  being,  no  matter  what 
the  shape  or  color  of  the  tabernacle  which  it 

inhabits Without  the  right  of  suffrage 

in  the  late  slave  States,  I  believe  the  slaves  had 
far  better  been  left  in  bondage.  This  doctrine 
of  a  f  white  man's  government '  is  as  atrocious 
as  the  infamous  sentiments  that  damned  the 
late  Chief  Justice  to  everlasting  fame ;  and, 
I  fear,  to  everlasting  fire  !  "  The  motion  pre 
vailed,  and  the  committee  entered  on  its  great 
work. 

The  first  step  taken  was  to  continue  the 
Freedmen's  Bureau.  The  act  was  called  "  An 
Act  to  continue  in  force,  and  to  amend  'An 
Act  to  establish  a  Bureau  for  the  relief  of  Freed- 
men  and  Refugees,'  and  for  other  purposes." 
Of  course  Johnson  vetoed  the  bill,  and  of 
course  the  Senate  and  House  promptly  passed 


134  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

the  bill,  notwithstanding  the  veto,  and  it  became 
a  law.  The  second  step  was  to  confer  equal 
rights  on  all  inhabitants  of  the  so-called  Confed 
erate  States.  This,  with  other  provisions  affect 
ing  representation,  and  the  validity  of  the 
public  debt,  was  secured  by  the  Fourteenth 
amendment.  The  resolution  proposing  such 
amendment,  was  of  course  vetoed  by  the  Presi 
dent,  passed  both  Houses  of  Congress,  by  the 
requisite  majority,  and  was  received  at  the  State 
Department  June  16,  1866.  The  amendment 
was  not  wholly  satisfactory  to  Mr.  Stevens. 
But  he  did  not  oppose  its  passage,  as  he 
fully  realized  that  it  was  necessary  to  do  some 
thing,  and,  rather  than  antagonize  it  and  lose 
all,  he  gave  it  his  aid.  But  a  few  days  after 
wards,  in  proposing  a  more  comprehensive  and 
stronger  scheme  to  the  House,  he  took  the 
opportunity  to  remark  that  something  more  was 
necessary  than  had  already  been  done. 

"  Notwithstanding  surrounding  discourage 
ments,  the  exhortation,  'Be  not  weary  in  well 
doing,'  encourages  me  to  make  one  more,  per 
haps  an  expiring  effort,  to  do  something  which 
shall  be  useful  to  my  fellow-men  ;  something  to 
elevate  and  enlighten  the  poor,  the  oppressed 
and  the  ignorant,  in  this  great  crisis  of  human 
affairs.  I  do  not  feel  that  this  august  body, 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  135 

this  grand  council  of  a  nation  of  freemen,  has 
done  anything  worthy  of  its  glorious  oppor 
tunity,  worthy  of  its  duty  to  the  immortal 
beings  whose  destinies  for  good  or  evil,  for  hap 
piness  or  woe,  it  holds  in  its  hands ;  when  I 
reflect  with  how  few  acts  of  justice,  with  how 
few  wise  enactments,  most  of  us  seem  content 
to  close  our  labors,  and  disperse  to  the  periph 
ery  of  the  nation  in  search  of  cool  shades,  purl 
ing  trout  streams,  and  to  see  our  bulls  and 
beeves.  I  beg  it  to  be  understood,  I  do  not 
claim  a  right  to  speak  this  reproachfully  or 
complainingly.  Especially,  when  I  consider  my 
own  life  —  too  much  of  which  has  been  spent 
in  idleness  or  frivolous  amusement  —  and  find 
myself  almost  ready  to  yield,  before  every  man 
is  secured  equal  rights  and  impartial  privi 
leges,  I  cannot  avoid  feeling  humbled.  I  can 
not  escape  the  pangs  of  self-condemnation. 
Congress  has  certainly  done  some  good  legisla 
tion  to  aid  the  white  man,  if  he  choose,  to  pro 
tect  the  poor  of  all  races  and  colors.  But 
nothing  has  been  done  to  enable  any  but  the 
wrhite  man  to  protect  himself.  How  precarious 
and  worthless  is  that  protection  which  depends 
wholly  on  the  will  of  others,  and  leaves  one 
self  defenceless !"  He  then  explained  the  de 
tails  of  the  plan  he  offered,  which,  if  accepted, 


136  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

would  make  the  future  secure,  and  then  touch- 
ingly  closed,  thus  :  — 

"  In  this,  perhaps  my  final  action  on  this 
great  question,  upon  a  careful  review,  I  can  see 
nothing  in  my  political  course,  especially  in 
regard  to  human  freedom,  which  I  would  wish 
to  have  expunged  or  changed.  I  believe  that 
we  must  all  account  hereafter  for  deeds  done  in 
the  body,  and  that  political  deeds  will  be  among 
those  accounts.  I  desire  to  take  to  the  bar  of 
that  final  settlement  the  record  which  I  shall 
this  day  make  on  the  great  question  of  human 
rights.  While  I  am  sure  it  will  not  make 
atonement  for  half  my  errors,  I  hope  it  will  be 
some  palliation. 

"  Are  there  any  who  will  venture  to  take  the 
list,  with  their  negative  seal  upon  it,  and  will 
dare  to  unroll  it  before  that  stern  Judge  who  is 
the  Father  of  the  immortal  beings  whom  they 
have  been  trampling  under  foot,  and  whose  souls 
they  have  been  crushing  out  ?  " 

As  soon  as  Congress  adjourned,  the  President, 
or  "the  man  at  the  other  end  of  the  avenue," 
as  Stevens  loved  to  call  him,  mounted  a  higher 
horse  than  ever,  and  rode  rough-shod  over  all. 
Men  were  "kicked  out,"  as  the  phrase  was, 
under  the  "  my  policy  "  rule  ;  and  hungry  rebels 
became  the  chief  magistrate's  boon  companions. 


•     THADDEUS  STEVENS.  137 

When  the  second  session  of  Congress  began  in 
December,  Mr.  Stevens  was  already  active,  old 
and  feeble  as  he  was,  in  his  hostility  to  Johnson. 
And  every  move  made  by  the  President  was 
promptly  checkmated  by  the  ff  commoner."  In 
fact  Johnson's  apostacy  was  Stevens's  oppor 
tunity  and  the  black  man's  boon.  For  it  is  more 
than  probable  that  had  not  the  Southern  plan 
been  disclosed  by  the  chief  magistrate,  none 
would  have  dreamed  of  the  dangers  ahead,  and 
the  safeguards  would  have  been  wanting  which 
his  folly  brought  about.  On  the  re-assembling 
of  Congress,  Mr.  Stevens  pressed  strongly  his 
schemes  for  reconstruction,  always  having  in 
view  that  there  should  be  no  reconstruction 
unless  the  corner-stone  was  equal  rights  for  all. 
Jan.  3,  1867,  in  offering  his  substitute  to 
the  bill  providing  for  the  restoration  of  the 
States  lately  in  insurrection  to  their  full  political 
rights,  he  made  an  argument  more  lengthy  than 
one  would  suppose  his  health  would  allow. 
But  so  dear  was  the  cause,  that  mind  and  soul 
triumphed  over  matter,  and  nobly  he  cham 
pioned  the  cause  of  freedom.  And  thus  he 
described  the  state  of  the  negro  at  that  date  : 
"  We  have  broken  the  material  shackles  of  four 
million  slaves.  We  have  unchained  them  from 
the  stake  so  as  to  allow  them  locomotion,  pro- 


138  TH A  DDE  US  STEVENS. 

vided  they  do  not  walk  in  paths  trod  by  white 
men.  We  have  allowed  them  the  unwonted 
privilege  of  attending  church,  if  they  can  do  so 
without  offending  the  si<Hit  of  their  former 

O  O 

masters.  We  have  even  given  them  that  high 
est  and  most  agreeable  evidence  of  liberty  as 
defined  by  the  'great  plebeian,'  the  'right  to 
work.'  But  in  what  have  we  enlarged  their 
liberty  of  thought?  In  what  have  we  taught 
them  the  science  and  granted  them  the  privilege 
of  self-government?  We  have  imposed  upon 
them  the  privileges  of  fighting  our  battles,  of 
dying  in  defence  of  freedom,  and  of  bearing 
their  equal  portion  of  the  taxes ;  but  where 
have  we  given  them  the  privilege  of  even  par 
ticipating  in  the  formation  of  the  laws  for  the 
government  of  their  native  land?  By  what 
civil  weapon  have  we  enabled  them  to  defend 
themselves  against  oppression  and  injustice? 
Call  you  this  liberty?  Call  you  this  a  free 
republic,  where  four  millions  are  subjects  but 
not  citizens  ?  Then  Persia,  with  her  kings  and 
satraps,  was  free  !  Then  Turkey  is  free  !  Their 
subjects  had  liberty  of  motion  and  labor,  but 
the  laws  were  made  without  and  against  their 
will ;  but  I  must  declare  that,  in  my  judgment, 
they  were  as  really  free  governments  as  ours  is 
to-day.  Think  not  I  would  slander  my  native 


TIT  A  DDE  US  STEVENS.  139 

land  :  I  would  reform  it.  Twenty  years  ago  I 
denounced  it  as  a  despotism.  Then,  twenty 
million  white  men  enchained  four  million  black 
men.  I  pronounce  it  no  nearer  to  a  true 
republic  now,  when  twenty-five  millions  of  a 
privileged  class  exclude  five  million  from  all 
participation  in  the  rights  of  the  government. 
The  freedom  of  a  government  does  not  depend 
upon  the  quality  of  its  laws,  but  upon  the  power 
that  has  the  right  to  create  them.  During  the 
dictatorship  of  Pericles,  his  laws  were  just,  but 
Greece  was  not  free.  During  the  last  century 
Russia  has  been  blessed  with  most  remarkable 
emperors,  who  have  generally  decreed  wise  and 
just  laws,  but  Russia  is  not  free.  No  govern 
ment  can  be  free  that  does  not  allow  all  its 
citizens  to  participate  in  the  formation  and 
execution  of  her  laws.  These  are  decrees  of 

O 

tyranny ;  but  every  other  government  is  a 
despotism.  It  has  always  been  observed  that 
the  larger  the  number  of  the  rulers  the  more 
cruel  the  treatment  of  the  subject  races.  It 
were  better  for  the  black  man  if  he  were  gov 
erned  by  one  king  than  by  twenty  million. 
.  .  .  But  it  will  be  said,  f  this  is  negro  equality.' 
What  is  negro  equality,  about  which  so  much 
is  said  by  knaves,  and  some  of  which  is  be 
lieved  by  men  who  are  not  fools?  It  means,  as 


140  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

understood  by  honest  Kepublicans,  just  this  and 
no  more  :  Every  man,  no  matter  what  his  race 
or  color,  every  earthly  being  who  has  an  im 
mortal  soul,  has  an  equal  right  to  justice,  hon 
esty  and  fair  play  with  every  other  man ;  and 
the  law  should  secure  him  those  rights.  The 
same  law  which  condemns  or  acquits  an  African 
should  condemn  or  acquit  a  white  man.  The 
same  law  which  gives  a  verdict  in  a  white  man's 
favor,  should  give  a  verdict  in  a  black  man's  fa 
vor,  on  the  same  state  of  facts.  Such  is  the  law 
of  God,  and  such  ought  to  be  the  law  of  man." 

Next  following  the  above  measure  came  the 
famous  reconstruction  bill  of  1867.  Here  again 
Mr.  Stevens  drew  his  physical  forces  together 
in  order  to  still  further  impress  his  ideas  of  the 
duty  of  the  hour,  and  to  warn  the  country  that 
mercy  is  oftentimes  among  the  worst  forms  of 
cruelty,  and  so  he  speaks  :  — 

"  For  the  last  few  months  Congress  has  been 
sitting  here,  and  while  the  South  has  been 
bleeding  at  every  pore,  Congress  has  done 
nothing  to  protect  the  loyal  people  there,  white 
or  black,  either  in  their  persons,  in  their  liberty, 
or  in  their  property.  Although  we  are  insensi 
ble  to  it,  the  whole  country  is  alive  to  the  effect 
of  the  supineness  with  which  this  Congress  has 
conducted  itself.  I  of  course  have  no  right  to 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  141 

reproach  anybody.  I  do  not  reproach  any  one. 
I  simply  grieve  that  such  is  the  condition  of  the 
country,  one  which  is  not  realized  apparently 
by  the  House,  and  especially  that  part  of  it 
which  is  responsible  to  the  nation.  We  are  en 
joying  ourselves  in  a  tolerable  way,  those  of  us 
who  have  health  and  spirits,  while  the  South  is 
covered  all  over  with  anarchy  and  murder  and 
rapine."  And  thus,  describing  the  state  of 
affairs,  he  addressed  himself  directly  to  those 
who  were  pleading  for  leniency  to  traitors  :  "  I 
know  that  gentlemen  on  the  other  side  of  the 
House  believe  that  this  is  a  harsh  measure ; 
and  so  does  the  gentleman  from  Ohio  on  this 
side,  who  to-day,  and  the  other  day,  made  beau 
tiful  appeals  to  our  sense  of  humanity,  and 
depicted  the  glory  of  a  great  nation  forgiving 
criminals  for  unrepented  crimes.  I  am  aware 
that  gentlemen,  here  and  elsewhere,  have 
seemed  to  be  ambitious  to  enunciate  principles 
of  forgiveness,  benevolence,  and  many  still 
more  startling  and  saintly  than  those  of  the 
Athenian  or  Galilean  sage.  Sir,  generosity  and 
benevolence  are  the  noblest  qualities  of  our 
nature,  and  when  you  squander  them  upon 
vagabonds  and  thieves  you  do  that  which  can 
command  no  respect  from  any  quarter.  The 
sublime,  I  might  almost  say  divine,  doctrines  or 


142  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

religion  promulgated  by  Socrates,  and  so  much 
more  nobly  and  divinely  expressed  in  the  Ser 
mon  on  the  Mount,  seem  to  require  acts  of  self- 
restraint  almost  beyond  the  reach  of  man.  And 
yet,  in  urging  forgiveness,  they  refer  simply  to 
private  offences,  to  personal  transgressions, 
where  men  can  well  forgive  their  enemies  and 
smother  their  feelings  of  revenge  without  injury 
to  anybody.  But  what  has  that  to  do  with 
municipal  punishment?  What  has  that  to  do 
with  political  sanction  of  political  crimes? 
When  public  tribunals,  municipalities,  nations, 
pass  sentence  for  crimes  committed  and  decree 
confiscation  for  crimes  unrepented,  there  is  no 
question  of  malignity.  When  the  judge  sen 
tences  the  convict  he  has  no  animosity.  When 
the  hangman  executes  the  culprit  he  rather 
pities  than  hates  him.  These  acts  have  no  fac 
ulty  of  cruelty  in  them.  Cruelty  does  not  belong 
to  their  vocabulary.  These  officers  of  the  law 
are  but  carrying  out  what  the  law  decrees. 
The  law  commands,  the  law  executes ;  but  the 
law  is  unimpassioned.  The  law  has  no  feeling 
of  malignity,  no  feeling  of  vengeance.  Gentle 
men  mistake,  therefore,  when  they  make  these 
appeals  to  us  in  the  name  of  humanity."  Was 
the  miserable  sophistry  of  "  mercy  "  and  "  am 
nesty  "  ever  better  answered  ? 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  143 

Nor  did  he  stop  here.  "  An  old  man  broken 
with  the  storms  of  state,"  he  never  faltered  in 
his  course,  but  with  iron  will  worked  on  in  the 
interests  of  freedom  and  justice.  Believing  that 
our  sympathies  should  be  enlisted  for  the  loyal 
Unionist  who  had  lost  all,  for  the  Union  soldier 
who  was  maimed,  for  the  black  man  who  was  to 
begin  life  anew  without  the  means  to  sustain  it, 
he  set  himself  to  work  to  have  confiscation  de 
creed  of  rebel  property  for  the  benefit  of  those 
three  classes.  And  when  the  confiscation  bill 
came  up  on  March  19,  1867,  he  announced  that 
to  that  end  he  should  devote  the  small  remnant 
of  his  life.  So,  with  one  foot  in  the  grave,  he 
still  pursued  his  grand  objects.  Supplementary 
reconstruction  bills,  "  military  bills,"  and  what 
not  were  drafted,  debated  and  passed  under  his 
hand.  In  a  debate  on  one  of  these  bills  in  July, 
1867,  he  expressed  himself  in  vigorous  terms 
regarding  the  treatment  which  should  have  been 
extended  to  the  rebels.  His  views  thereon  will 
commend  themselves  to  every  fearless  patriot. 
"  While  I  would  not  be  bloody-minded,  yet  if  I 
had  niy  way  I  would  long  ago  have  organized  a 
military  tribunal  under  military  pyvver,  and  I 
would  have  put  Jefferson  Davis  and  all  the 
members  of  his  Cabinet  on  trial  for  the  murders 
at  Andersonville,  the  murders  at  -Salisbury,  the 


144  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

shooting  down  our  prisoners  of  war  in  cold 
blood.  Every  man  of  them  is  responsible  for 
those  crimes.  It  was  a  mockery  to  try  that 
wicked  fellow,  Wirz,  and  make  him  responsible 
for  acts  of  which  the  Confederate  Cabinet  were 
guilty.  Of  course  they  should  be  condemned. 
Whether  they  should  be  executed  afterwards  I 
give  no  opinion.  As  to  the  question  of  confis 
cation,  I  think  that  a  man  who  has  murdered  a 
thousand  men,  who  has  robbed  a  thousand 
widows  and  orphans,  who  has  burned  down 
a  thousand  houses,  escapes  well,  if,  owning 
$100,000  he  is  fined  $50,000  as  a  punishment 
and  to  repair  his  ravages.  I  do  not  say,  nor  do 
I  ask,  that  anybody  should  be  executed  in  this 
country.  There  has  got  to  be  a  sickly  humanity 
here  which  I  dare  not  get  alongside  of  for  fear 
I  might  catch  it.  And  it  is  now  held  by  one  of 
the  most  liberal  and  enlightened  gentlemen  in 
this  country,  that  we  should  even  pay  a  portion 
of  the  damages  inflicted  on  the  rebels,  and  pay 
a  portion  of  the  rebel  debt." 

In  those  days  the  friends  of  liberty,  knowing 
that  the  "commoner"  had  not  long  to  last, 
crowded  into  the  House  whenever  it  was 
known  that  he  was  to  speak,  though  for 
a  second.  And  all  wondered  at  the  man's 
vitality.  The  press  had  his  biography  set  up 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  145 

in  print,  momentarily  expecting  his  death. 
His  face  grew  thinner  day  by  day,  his  lips  were 
bloodless,  and  his  dark  wig,  with  its  hair  hanging 
bv  the  pale  cheeks,  gave  him  the  appearance  of 
a  corpse.  His  gestures  were  angular,  his 
movements  stiff  and  constrained,  and  he  was 
often  supported  by  others  while  speaking. 
What  he  said  could  not  be  heard  in  the  galleries, 
save  when  stun<?  at  the  cowardice  of  his  asso- 

O 

ciates,  he  flamed  up  and  the  excitement  carried 
his  voice  to  the  remotest  corner.  Still,  he  fol 
lowed  on  in  the  course  he  had  laid  out  for 
himself,  and  had  so  faithfully  followed.  Some 
of  the  short  speeches  in  those  latter  days  were 
among  his  best.  One  in  particular,  1  remem 
ber,  which  illustrates  so  well  his  sarcasm,  his 
mother  wit,  and  sterling  sense  of  humanity,  that 
I  give  it  in  full.  It  was  in  reply  to  Mr.  Brooks 
of  New  York. 

"Mr.  Speaker  —  I  have  listened  with  very 
great  pleasure  (as  I  always  do)  to  the  golden- 
mouthed  gentleman  from  New  •  York  in  his 
attempt  to  prove  the  Bible  a  lie.  That  book 
says  that  God  created  of  one  blood  all  the 
nations  of  the  earth.  The  question  at  issue 
between  the  gentleman  from  New  York  and  the 
authors  of  that  sacred  volume,  I  shall  not 
attempt  to  decide.  It  is  too  high  for  me.  But, 


146  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

Sir,  the  gentleman  has  given  us  a  histoiy  of  the 
negro  race  from,  I  believe,  the  time  of  the 
Queen  of  Sheha.  I  am  not  sure  whether  he 
included  her  in  that  race  or  not.  But,  going 
over  the  whole  field  from  that  time  to  this,  he 
has,  I  think,  very  well  described  the  shape  of 
the  negro's  foot,  the  crook  of  his  ankle,  the 
contour  of  his  face.  And  then  the  gentleman 
went  on  to  consider  the  intellect  of  the  negro. 
Now,  does  the  gentleman  by  all  this  mean  to  say 
that  the  sons  of  Ethiopia  —  of  whom  the  great 
poet  of  antiquity  speaks  as  the  '  blameless  sons 
of  Ethiopia,'  among  whom  the  gods  always 
retired  when  they  wished  to  spend  an  innocent 
and  a  quiet  hour  —  have  not  immortal  souls ; 
that  they  are  to  be  classed  among  'the  beasts 
that  perish ' ;  and  that  God,  who  is  to  judge 
them,  will  not  damn  him  of  he  deserves  it? 
(Laughter.)  I  am  sorry,  Sir,  if  such  has  come 
to  be  the  condition  of  that  race  in  this  country. 
I  had  thought  that  the  members  of  that  race  had 
shown  in  our  day  some  evidences  of  strength 
and  power.  To  be  sure,  I  looked  upon  them 
as  barbarians  for  having,  with  their  own  hands 
in  defence  of  liberty,  stricken  down  thousands  of 
the  friends  of  the  gentleman  who  has  been 
enlightening  us  to-day.  (Laughter.)  This 
conduct  on  their  part  did,  I  confess,  show  a 


Til  A  DDE  US  STEVENS.  147 

cruelty  and  a  barbarism  which  are  perhaps  hard 
to  excuse.  But  the  gentleman  must  recollect  that 
all  are  not  equally  mild  in  their  demeanor,  and 
that  even  the  white  man  might  have  done  the 
same  thing  had  he  been  in  a  similar  condition. 
As  to  intellect,  there  are  various  degrees  of  it. 
In  that  regard,  the  gentleman  from  New  York 
towers  above  the  rest  of  us,  though,  I  fear,  he 
sometimes  abuses  his  superiority  by  the  decla 
mation  which  he  travels  out  of  his  road  to  inflict 
upon  us  with  regard  to  the  various  nations  of 
the  earth.  But  that  in  intellectual  gifts  the 
gentleman  stands  above  all  of  us,  no  man  who 
has  heard  him  to-day  or  heretofore  can  deny  ; 
and  I  do  not,  I  assure  you,  Sir,  speak  this  ironi 
cally  (laughter),  for  I  do  not  know  when  I 
have  heard  anything  more  eloquent  than  the 
discourse  which  the  learned  gentleman  has  given 
us  to-day.  But  I  have  one  proposition  to  make. 
For  the  oratorical  championship  of  America  I 
am  willing  to  match  Fred  Douglass  or  Langston 
against  the  gentleman  from  New  York.  I  will 
allow  the  latter  gentleman  to  select  two  out  of 
three  of  the  judges.  Let  the  topic  be  anything 
the  gentleman  pleases,  except  the  negro's  shin 
(laughter),  and  if  at  the  end  of  the  discussion  he 
does  not  '  throw  up  the  sponge '  I  will  admit 
that  the  negro  is  an  inferior  animal  —  not  only 


148  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

inferior  to  the  gentleman  from  New  York,  but 
inferior  to  the  rest  of  us."     (Laughter.) 

The  long  struggle  with  the  President  finally 
culminated  in  the  impeachment  trial.  The 
moving  spirit,  of  course,  could  have  been  none 
other  than  Thaddeus  Stevens.  Others  there 
were  equally  ready  to  be  the  standard-bearer  in 
that  fight.  But  all  felt  that  Mr.  Stevens  should 
have  the  first  place.  And,  on  Feb.  22,  1868, 
as  chairman  of  the  committee  on  reconstruction, 
he  reported  the  following  resolution :  "  Re 
solved,  That  Andrew  Johnson,  President  of  the 
United  States,  be  impeached  of  high  crimes  and 
misdemeanors  in  office."  Feb.  24,  Mr.  Stevens 
and  John  A.  Bingham  were  appointed  a  com 
mittee  to  notify  the  Senate  of  the  action  of  the 
House.  On  the  next  day  Mr.  Stevens  and 
Mr.  Bingham  appeared  at  the  bar  of  the  Senate 
and  were  announced  as  the  committee  from  the 
House  of  Representatives.  It  was  a  proud 
moment  for  the  rf  commoner."  It  was  the  cul 
minating  point  of  his  long  struggle  with  Johnson. 
The  battle  had  been  fought,  and  he  stood  before 
the  Senate  to  do  what  none  other  had  ever  done 
—  to  impeach  the  President  of  the  United 
States.  Of  his  appearance  on  that  solemn  occa 
sion  Mr.  Sumner  has  given  ample  testimony. 
"  I  know  not  if  Mr.  Stevens  could  be  called  an 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  149 

orator.  And  yet  I  doubt  if  words  were  ever 
delivered  with  more  effect  than  when,  broken 
with  years  and  decay,  he  stood  before  the 
Senate,  and  in  the  name  of  the  House  of  Repre 
sentatives  and  of  all  the  people  of  the  United 
States,  impeached  Andrew  Johnson,  President 
of  the  United  States,  of  high  crimes  and  mis 
demeanors  in  office.  Who  can  forget  his  steady, 
solemn  utterance  of  this  great  arraignment? 
The  words  were  few,  but  they  will  sound 
through  the  ages.  The  personal  triumph  in  his 
position  at  that  moment  was  merged  in  the 
historic  grandeur  of  the  occasion.  For  a  long 
time,  against  opposition  of  all  kinds,  against 
misconceptions  of  the  law,  and  against  apologies 
for  transactions  without  apologies,  he  had  insisted 
on  impeachment ;  and  now  this  old  man,  totter 
ing  to  your  door,  dragged  the  Chief  Magistrate 
of  the  Republic  to  judgment.  It  was  he  who 
did  this  thing,  and  I  should  do  poor  justice  to 
his  life  if  on  this  occasion  I  failed  to  express 
my  gratitude  for  the  heroic  deed.  His  merit  is 
none  the  less  because  other  influences  prevailed 
in  the  end."  Mr.  Stevens's  failing  health  pre 
vented  his  attending  to  the  duties  of  the  trial  in 
any  great  degree.  His  part  had  really  been 
played  in  getting  the  House  to  pass  the  resolu 
tion  of  impeachment.  Still,  with  the  grave 


150  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

staring  wide  before  him,  he  addressed  himself 
to  whatever  work  was  waiting  for  him.  One 
of  his  last  acts  in  that  Fortieth  Congress  was  his 
championship  of  the  free  school  system  for  the 
District  of  Columbia.  He  wished  to  do  for  that 
district  what  he  had  done  for  his  own  State. 

"  Obeyed  the  voice  at  eve  obeyed  at  prime." 

Well  might  one  of  his  eulogists  say,  "  There  is 
not  a  child  in  Pennsylvania  conning  a  spelling- 
book  beneath  the  humble  rafters  of  a  village 
school,  who  does  not  owe  him  gratitude ;  not  a 
citizen  rejoicing  in  that  security  which  is  found 
only  in  liberal  institutions,  founded  on  the  equal 
rights  of  all,  who  is  not  his  debtor."  On  July 
27,  1868,  Congress  took  a  recess,  and  Mr. 
Stevens  had  the  satisfaction  of  knowing  that 
though  his  failing  condition  told  him  he  might 
never  again  carry  on  his  great  battles  of  freedom 
in  that  arena  which  had  known  him  so  long,  yet 
nearly  every  wish  had  been  granted  him.  He 
had  seen  slavery  abolished ;  he  had  seen  the 
freedmen  lifted  to  equality  of  political  rights  by 
act  of  Congress ;  he  had  seen  the  colored  race 
throughout  the  whole  land  lifted  to  equality  of 
civil  rights  by  act  of  Congress.  It  only  re 
mained  that  he  should  see  them  throughout 
the  whole  land  lifted  to  the  same  equality  in 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  151 

political  rights,  and  then  the  promises  of  the 
Declaration  of  Independence  would  be  all  ful 
filled.  But  he  was  called  away  before  this  final 
triumph. 


CHAPTER  VII. 


CARLYLE  tells  us  in  his  essay  on  Mirabeau, 
that  the  great  Frenchman  had  about  him  that 
"fond  gaillard"  (basis  of  gayety),  which  car 
ried  him  through  many  difficulties.  Stevens 
possessed  the  same  quality  in  a  remarkable  de 
gree.  Beneath  the  bitter  sarcasm,  the  merci 
less  thrust,  the  unsparing  ridicule,  there  was 
always  a  solid  ground-work  of  true  wit,  a  "fond 
gaillard"  a  basis  of  gayety.  Though  life  was 
to  him  a  battle  and  not  a  dream,  one  long 
struggle,  a  constant  contention  with  difficulties, 
yet  there  crops  out  everywhere,  this  "  basis  of 
gayety." 

In  the  halls  of  Congress  how  often  he  anni 
hilated  the  weary  argument  of  some  doubt 
ing  Thomas  by  a  single  query,  a  droll  as 
sertion, —  not  now  preserved  —  for  often  in  the 
record  we  come  across  the  reporter's  note,  that 
"Mr.  Stevens,  of  Pennsylvania,  from  his  seat 
made  some  remark  inaudible  to  the  reporter." 
152 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  153 

To  a  certain  degree,  Mr.  Stevens  met  the  fate 
of  John  Randolph,  who  said  that  all  the  bastard 
wit  of  the  country  was  left  at  his  door.  But 
Stevens  used  his  powers  of  raillery  and  ridicule 
simply  as  a  weapon  to  a  great  end.  He  must 
destroy  his  antagonist,  and  the  best  fitted 
weapon  must  be  used.  The  tools  to  him  who 
can  use  them.  During  the  debate  on  the 
abolition  of  slavery,  some  gentlemen  thought 
such  a  course  unadvisable,  as  it  would  tend  to 
excite  the  South.  Stevens  pricked  that  bubble 
of  imbecility  by  informing  the  members  that  it 
reminded  him  of  the  timid  captain  in  the  Rev 
olution,  who  raised  a  company  of  soldiers  with 
which  to  fight  the  British,  and  when  his  com 
pany  was  brought  before  the  enemy  and  were 
about  to  shoot,  cried  out,  "  For  God's  sake, 
don't  fire ;  for  don't  you  see  it  will  make  them 
a  great  deal  madder ! "  During  the  discussion 
on  one  of  the  early  emancipation  resolutions, 
which  was  in  a  very  mild  form,  the  "great 
commoner"  expressed  his  inability  to  see  what 
made  one  side  so  anxious  to  pass,  or  the  other 
side  so  anxious  to  defeat  it,  for  he  considered 
it  about  the  "most  diluted  milk  and  water 
gruel "  proposition  that  was  ever  given  to  the 
American  nation.  In  fact,  he  said,  the  only 
reason  he  could  discover  why  any  gentlemen 


154  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

should  wish  to  postpone  the  measure  was  for 
the  purpose  of  having  a  chemical  analysis,  to  see 
whether  there  might  be  any  poison  in  it.  On 
the  free  trade  and  protection  debate,  having 
referred  to  the  Democrats  as  being  interested  in 
the  cause  of  England,  save  a  fragment,  who 
were  right  on  the  question,  and  being  inter 
rupted  by  Cochrane,  of  New  York,  inquiring 
whether  by  *f  fragment "  he  alluded  to  Mr. 
Florence,  who  was  for  specific  duties  on  iron, 
he  replied  :  "  I  do ;  but  I  do  not  call  him  a  vul 
gar  fraction."  In  the  early  part  of  the  war, 
when  many  Republicans  were  extremely  weak- 
kneed,  and  it  required  all  Stevens'  wrill  and 
power  to  bring  them  up  to  concert  pitch,  he 
answered  some  one  who  complained  of  his  aus 
terity  by  telling  him  that  he  knew  that  many 
had  the  good  fortune  to  be  made  of  more 
pliable  stuff  than  himself,  and  that  one-half  of 
the  world  everywhere  melts  into  the  softest 
dough,  from  the  nape  of  the  neck  to  the 
os  coccygis.  His  references  to  President  John 
son  were  always  amusing.  His  "man  at  the 
other  end  of  the  avenue,"  and  "  the  late  lamented 
Andrew  Johnson,  of  blessed  memory,"  will 
never  be  forgotten.  Johnson  always  claimed 
that  Simmer  and  Stevens  were  plotting  to  assas 
sinate  him.  This  was  always  very  entertaining 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  155 

to  Stevens,  —  to  have  the  President  look  upon 
him  as  a  probable  assassin.  And  on  the  occasion 
of  his  having  photographs  of  himself  taken,  being 
informed  by  a  friend  that  he  purchased  one,  he 
said  drolly :  "  Which  picture  did  you  buy,  the 
assassination  one?"  The  "assassination  one" 
represented  Mr.  Stevens  with  his  hand  to  his 
forehead,  apparently  engaged  in  deep  thought. 
But  the  truthfulness  of  his  sayings  is  what  gave 
them  a  large  part  of  their  flavor.  During  a 
discussion  in  committee  on  a  Southern  election 
case,  where  fraud  was  charged  on  either  side, 
the  members  expressed  themselves  very  frank 
ly  about  the  qualifications  of  the  contestants. 
"Well,  the  sitting  member  is  a  damned  rascal," 
said  one.  "  So  is  the  contestant,"  joined  in 
another.  "True,"  said  Stevens;  "but  which 
is  our  damned  rascal?"  At  the  time  of  the 
Voorhis  disputed  election,  wrhere  the  decision 
was  against  Voorhis,  the  defeated  candidate 
upbraided  Stevens  in  very  strong  terms. 

"There,  Stevens, "he  said,  "I  knew  your  old 
Republican  committee  would  decide  against  me 
anyhow,  but  I  knew  you  were  an  honest  man 
and  I  supposed  you  would  do  the  fair  thing. 
But  you're  as  bad  as  the  rest  of  them."  "  Oh  ! 
no,"  said  the  "  commoner,"  "  the  fact  was,  we 
needed  just  one  vote  in  the  House  to  give  us  a 


156  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

requisite  two-thirds,  and  so  we  had  to  seat  the 
Republican  in  order  to  carry  on  reconstruction. 
Your  case  was  good  enough,  but  it  was  that 
two-thirds  vote  that  killed  you, — that  fatal  two- 
thirds."  And  he  hobbled  off  with  his  peculiar 
chuckle.  Voorhis  appreciated  the  situation  and 
smiled  as  well.  When  Gen.  Taylor  came  to 
Washington,  shortly  after  the  war,  he  visited 
Sumner,  Stevens,  and  others  with  reference  to 
a  meeting  of  Jefferson  Davis  and  Northern 
leaders.  He  expressed  his  delight  at  the 
cordial  and  elegant  greeting  extended  him  by 
Mr.  Sumner,  but  complained  because  he  could 
not  get  a  definite  answer.  "  Why,  Sumner 
talked  for  two  hours  on  Greece  and  Rome,  and 
uttered  numberless  quotations  from  dead  lan 
guages,  but  never  reached  the  point ;  while 
Thaddeus  Stevens,  who  was  the  most  honest  of 
them  all,  said  in  his  opinion  Jefferson  Davis  and 
the  rest  of  us  ought  to  have  been  executed  long 
since." 

The  easy  way  in  which  he  referred  to  his  own 
health  has  also  this  "  basis  of  gayety."  During 
his  later  years  he  was  carried  up  the  Capitol 
steps  in  the  arms  of  two  brawny  negroes.  One 
day  he  looked  toward  them  affectionately,  and 
said:  "What  shall  I  do  when  you  die?"  A 
correspondent  of  the  Philadelphia  Times  says 


TH  A  DDE  US  STEVENS.  157 

that  one  autumn  Mr.  Stevens  was  very  ill  with 
an  attack  of  dropsy  of  the  heart  and  chest. 
Such  was  the  pressure  of  the  water  upon  his 
heart  and  lungs  that  he  could  scarcely  breathe. 
The  doctors  prescribed  very  powerful  remedies, 
but  they  seemed  to  have  no  effect.  So  great 
was  the  fear  of  suffocation,  that  when  the  doc 
tor  paid  his  last  visit  for  the  night,  at  10  P.  M., 
in  answer  to  his  "  good-night,"  Mr.  Stevens 
said :  "  Good-night,  doctor :  I  don't  know 
whether  I'll  see  you  again?"  The  physician 
said  something  re-assuring,  knowing,  however, 
that  his  condition  was  most  critical.  The  next 
morning  when  he  went  over  to  see  his  patient, 
he  found  him  sitting  in  bed  smiling  and  very 
lively.  "Ah!  good  morning,  doctor:  I'm  all 
right  this  morning ;  medicine  began  to  take 
effect  a  couple  of  hours  after  you  left."  And 
then  with  a  grim  and  gratified  smile,  "  I've  dis 
appointed  those  fellows  again,  but  last  night  I 
was  mighty  afraid  I'd  have  to  head  a  little  pro 
cession  up  the  hill,"  with  a  motion  of  his  hand 
toward  the  cemetery.  "Those  fellows"  were 
certain  politicians  who  were  waiting  for  the  suc 
cession.  One  of  the  best  specimens  of  Stevens's 
drollery  and  raillery  is  found  in  a  speech  to  his 
constituency,  at  the  time  Johnson  was  "  swing 
ing  round  the  circle." 


158  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

"I  come  not  to  make  a  speech,  but  for  the 
want  of  one.  When  I  left  Washington  I  was 
somewhat  worn  by  labors  and  disease,  and  I 
was  directed  by  my  physician  neither  to  think, 
to  speak,  or  read  until  the  next  session  of  Con 
gress,  or  I  should  not  regain  my  strength.  I 
have  followed  the  first  injunction  most  re 
ligiously,  for  I  believe  I  have  not  let  an  idea 
pass  through  my  mind  to  trouble  me  since  Con 
gress  adjourned.  The  second  one  —  not  to 
speak  —  I  was  seduced  from  keeping  by  some 
noble  friends  in  the  mountain  districts  of  Penn 
sylvania,  and  I  made  a  speech  at  Bedford,  the 
only  one  I  have  made.  The  third  one  —  not  to 
read  —  I  have  followed  almost  literally. 

"  It  is  true,  I  have  amused  myself  with  a  little 
light  frivolous  reading.  I  have  taken  up  the 
dailies  and  publications  of  that  kind,  and  read 
things  that  would  make  no  impression  on  my 
mind.  For  instance,  there  was  a  serial  account 
from  day  to  day  of  a  very  remarkable  circus 
that  travelled  through  the  country,  from  Wash 
ington  to  Chicago  and  St.  Louis,  and  Louisville 
back  to  Washington.  I  read  that  with  some 
interest,  expecting  to  see  in  so  celebrated  an 
establishment  —  one  which,  from  its  heralding, 
was  to  beat  Dan  liice  and  all  the  old  cir- 
cusses  that  ever  went  forth  —  I  expected  great 


Til  A  DDE  US  STEVENS.  159 

wit  from  the  celebrated  character  of  its  clowns 
(laughter).  They  were  well  provided  with 
clowns  :  instead  of  one  there  were  two,  as  the 
circus  was  to  have  a  large  circulation.  One  of 
these  clowns  was  high  in  office  and  somewhat 
advanced  in  years :  the  other  was  a  little  less 
advanced  in  office,  but  older  in  years.  They 
started  out  with  a  very  respectable  stock  company. 
In  order  to  attract  attention  they  took  with  them, 
for  instance,  a  celebrated  general ;  they  took 
with  them  an  eminent  naval  officer,  and  they 
chained  him  to  the  rigging  so  that  he  could  not 
get  away,  though  he  tried  to  do  so  once  or 
twice. 

"  They  announced  the  most  respectable  stock 
company  that  ever  went  forth  with  a  menagerie 
or  a  circus,  though  they  had  no  very  good  man 
for  the  spring-boards,  but  they  took  with  them 
for  a  short  distance  a  very  good  man  accustomed 
to  ground  and  lofty  tumbling,  called  Mont 
gomery  Blair  (laughter) .  And  as  they  wanted 
to  get  up  side  shows,  as  is  always  precedent 
where  anything  is  to  be  made  out  of  these  con 
cerns,  they  switched  him  off  in  various  directions 
with  a  hand  organ  and  a  monkey  ( laughter) .  In 
the  East  they  called  his  monkey  Senator  Doo- 
little,  because  he  looked  so  much  like  one 
(laughterj.  Up  through  the  mountain  region 


160  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

where  I  encountered  them,  Montgomery  Blair 
was  there,  and  his  monkey  and  organ  was 
called  Judge  Kinnel. 

"  But  the  circus  went  on  all  the  time,  giving 
performances  at  different  points,  sometimes  one 
clown  performing  and  sometimes  the  other.  So 
far  as  I  was  able  to  judge,  the  younger  clown  was 
the  most  vigorous,  and  had  the  most  energy  and 
malignity.  The  elder  clown,  owing  to  the  wear 
and  tear  of  age  and  suffering  —  you  know  he 
had  his  arm  broken  and  his  jaw  broken,  and  his 
neck  broken  almost  (laughter) — inducing  a  ne 
cessity  for  opiates,  which  had  very  much  broken 
down  his  vigor  —  I  looked  upon  his  performance 
as  rather  silly.  For  instance  the  younger  clown 
told  them,  in  the  language  of  the  ancient  heroes 
who  trod  the  stage,  that  he  had  it  in  his  power, 
if  he  chose,  to  be  Dictator.  The  elder  clown 
pointed  to  the  other  one,  and  said  to  the  people, 
'  Will  you  have  him  for  President,  or  will  you 
take  him  for  King?'  (Laughter.)  He  left  you 
but  one  alternative. 

"  You  are  obliged  to  take  him  for  one  or  the 
other,  either  for  President  or  King,  if  fMy 
Policy '  prevails.  I  am  not  following  them  all 
round.  I  shall  not  describe  to  you  how  some 
times  they  cut  outside  the  circle  and  entered 
into  street  broils  with  common  blackguards; 


TH A  DDE  US  STEVENS.  161 

how  they  fought  at  Cleveland  and  Indianapolis, 
and  other  points,  I  shall  not  tell  you ;  for  is  it 
not  all  written  down  in  Colonel  Forney's  Chroni 
cle?  (Laughter  and  cheers.) 

"  But,  coining  round,  they  told  you,  or  one  of 
them  did,  that  he  had  been  everything  but  one. 
He  had  been  a  tailor,  I  think  he  did  not  say 
drunken  tailor  :  no,  he  had  been  a  tailor  (laugh 
ter).  He  had  been  a  constable  (laughter).  He 
had  been  city  alderman  (laughter).  He  had 
been  in  the  Legislature.  God  help  that  Legis 
lature  (great  merriment).  Pie  had  been  in 
Congress  and  now  he  was  President.  He  had 
been  everything  but  one  —  he  had  never  been  a 
hangman,  and  he  asked  leave  to  hang  Thad 
Stevens"  (laughter). 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

GOES   OVER   TO   THE   MAJORITY. 

POWER  is  only  a  tool.  It  belongs  to  nobody. 
Its  possessor  is  merely  a  trustee  thereof  as  the 
opulent  is  simply  steward  of  his  wealth.  The 
purpose  is  the  man.  "The  tools  to  him  who 
can  use  them."  Stevens's  purpose  was  the 
equality  of  all  men.  He  supplemented  Jeffer 
son's  "all  men  are  created  equal,"  by  "born 
equal,  men  continue  so  before  the  law."  So  far 
as  the  tools  the  Almighty  gave  him  would  allow, 
he  had  accomplished  his  work.  It  is  sad  that 
he  could  not  live  to  see  complete  justice  done  to 
the  ostracized  unionist,  and  hold  intact  the  box 
for  the  negro's  ballot.  That  would  have  rounded 
his  life.  But  it  was  ordered  otherwise.  "Th' 
unfinished  window  in  Aladdin's  tower,  unfinished 
must  remain."  He  had  lived  long  enough  to 
behold  many  of  the  fruits  of  his  labor.  He  saw 
slavery  dethroned,  the  broad  gulf  in  the  nation 
closing,  the  black  man  standing  in  the  light  of 
freedom.  And  so,  having  fulfilled  the  work 
162 


THADDEUS  STEVENS.  163 

given  him  to  do,  on  the  llth  day  of  August, 
A.  D.  1868,  he  went  over  to  the  majority.  His 
place  is  with  our  "  large-hearted  heroes,  born  in 
better  years."  "He  sleeps  with  the  primeval 
giants,  he  has  gone  over  to  the  majority.  Abiit 
ad  plures" 

As  he  was  dying,  he  said  to  his  nephew  that 
the  great  questions  of  the  day  were  reconstruc 
tion,  the  finances,  and  the  railway  system  of  the 
country.  He  expressed  the  belief  that  Grant 
would  be  elected  President,  and  would  carry 
out  the  spirit  as  well  as  the  letter  of  the  recon 
struction  laws.  And  in  that  hope  he  died.  On 
Aug.  13,  his  body  was  removed  to  the  rotunda 
of  the  Capitol,  the  coffin  being  borne  by  five 
colored  and  three  white  pall-bearers.  The  guard 
of  honor  were  the  Butler  Zouaves,  a  colored 
military  organization  of  Washington.  The 
remains  were  then  taken  to  Lancaster  and 
deposited  in  a  humble  cemetery,  and  for  his 
epitaph  he  had  written  the  following  :  — 

I  repose  in  this  quiet  and  secluded  spot,  not 
from  any  natural  preference  for  solitude,  but  finding 
other  cemeteries  limited  by  charter  rules  as  to  race, 
I  have  chosen  it  that  I  might  be  enabled  to  illus 
trate  in  my  death  the  principles  which  I  have 
advocated  through  a  long  life  —  equality  of  man 
before  his  Creator. 


164  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 

This  was  all  he  did  for  his  own  resting-place. 
But  in  his  will,  written  during  the  last  year  of 
his  life,  he  did  not  forget  to  make  ample  provi 
sion  for  the  care  of  his  mother's  lot  —  that  mother 
to  whom  he  ascribed  whatever  success  he  had 
met  in  life.  And  the  clause  ran  thus  :  "That  the 
sexton  keep  her  grave  in  good  order,  and  plant 
roses  and  other  cheerful  flowers  at  each  of  the 
four  corners  of  said  grave  every  spring."  And 
farther  on  in  the  will,  in  devising  $1000  in  aid 
of  the  establishment  at  his  home  of  a  Baptist 
church,  of  which  society  his  mother  was  an 
earnest  member,  he  says  :  — 

"  I  do  this  out  of  respect  to  the  memory  of  my 
mother,  to  whom  I  owe  what  little  of  prosperity  I 
have  had  on  earth,  which,  small  as  it  is,  I  desire 
emphatically  to  acknowledge." 

Nothing  is  more  touching  than  the  strong  love 
for  his  mother  which  pervaded  the  whole  life  of 
this  man,  whom  so  many  thought  cruel,  bitter, 
and  self-willed. 

I  fear  it  is  rash  in  me  to  have  praised  such  a 
hero  in  these  "  piping  times  of  peace,"  when 
civil  service  pamphleteers  and  public  penurists 
thrive.  But  it  is  because  he  was  so  much  of  a 
man,  and  they  so  little ;  because  he  sank  his 
own  personal  advantage  in  the  propagation  of  a 
royal  purpose,  while  they  feign  the  possession 


TIIADDEUS  STEVENS.  165 

of  sentiments  that  will  bring  them  praise  and 
gain,  that  I  have  told  this  meagre  story  of  his 
life,  and  for  this  brief  space  held  back  his  name 
and  fame  from  the  eternal  silence  whither  he 
has  gone.  He  belongs  with  the  giants  of  the 
race,  with  the  defenders  of  justice,  with  the 
friends  of  truth,  with  the  lovers  of  liberty  - 
the  stalwarts  of  humanity !  "  Politician,  cal 
culator,  time-server,  stand  aside!  A  hero 
statesman  has  passed  to  his  reward." 


APPENDIX. 


I.  MISSOURI  COMPROMISE. 
II.  SUMNER'S  EULOGY  ON  STEVENS. 


APPENDIX. 


I. 

MISSOURI  COMPROMISE. 

THE  inciting  cause  making  possible  the  birth 
of  the  Republican  party  was  the  repeal  of  the 
Missouri  Compromise  contained  in  the  Kansas- 
Nebraska  legislation.  It  is  therefore  altogether 
fitting  and  proper  that  all  should  understand  the 
full  meaning  and  history  of  that  phrase,  the 
"  Missouri  Compromise." 

Jan.  8,  1818,  the  Speaker  of  the  House  of 
Representatives  presented  to  that  body  a  petition 
from  sundry  inhabitants  of  the  Territory  of 
Missouri  praying  that  said  Territory  might  be 
erected  into  a  State,  and  admitted  into  the 
Union,  on  an  equal  footing  with  the  original 
States.  On  March  16,  a  bill  to  that  effect  was 
reported  to  the  House,  read  twice,  and  then 
referred  to  the  Committee  of  the  Whole.  Feb. 
15,  1819,  the  House  being  in  committee  of  the 
whole,  Mr.  Tallmadge  (of  New  York)  moved 
to  amend  the  bill  by  inserting  the  following 
proviso :  — 

169 


170  APPENDIX. 

"  And  provided,  —  That  the  further  introduc 
tion  of  slavery  or  involuntary  servitude  be 
prohibited,  except  for  the  punishment  of  crimes, 
whereof  the  party  shall  have  been  fully  con 
victed  ;  and  that  all  children  born  within  the 
said  State,  after  the  admission  thereof  into  the 
Union,  shall  be  free  at  the  age  of  twenty-five 
years." 

This  proviso  was  strongly  opposed  by  Henry 
Clay,  and  brilliantly  supported  by  Mr.  Taylor, 
of  New  York,  who  stated  the  argument  in  favor 
of  it  with  great  force.  Regarding  the  power  of 
Congress  to  insert  such  a  proviso,  Mr.  Taylor 
spoke  as  follows  :  — 

ft  Congress  has  no  power  unless  it  be  expressly 
granted  by  the  Constitution,  or  necessary  to  the 
execution  of  some  power  clearly  delegated. 
What,  then,  are  the  grants  made  to  Congress 
in  relation  to  the  Territories  ?  The  third  section 
of  the  fourth  article  declares,  that  'the  Congress 
shall  have  power  to  dispose  of  and  make  all 
needful  rules  and  regulations  respecting  the  ter 
ritory  or  other  property  belonging  to  the  United 
States.'  It  would  be  difficult  to  devise  a  more 
comprehensive  grant  of  power.  The  whole 
subject  is  put  at  the  disposal  of  Congress,  as 
well  the  right  of  judging  what  regulations  are 
proper  to  be  made,  as  the  power  of  making 


APPENDIX.  171 

them  is  clearly  granted.  Until  admitted  into 
the  Union,  this  political  society  is  a  territory ; 
all  the  preliminary  steps  relating  to  its  admission 
are  territorial  regulations.  Hence,  in  all  such 
cases,  Congress  has  exercised  the  power  of 
determining  by  whom  the  Constitution  should 
be  made,  how  its  framers  should  be  elected, 
when  and  where  they  should  meet,  and  what 
propositions  should  be  submitted  to  their  deci 
sion.  After  its  formation,  the  Congress  may 
examine  its  provisions,  and  if  approved,  admit 
the  State  into  the  Union,  in  pursuance  of  a 
power  delegated  by  the  same  section  of  the 
Constitution,  in  the  following  words  :  'New 
States  may  be  admitted  by  the  Congress  into 
the  Union.'  This  grant  of  power  is  evidently 
alternative ;  its  exercise  is  committed  to  the 
sound  discretion  of  Congress ;  no  injustice  is 
done  by  declining  it.  But  if  Congress  has  the 
powrer  of  altogether  refusing  to  admit  new  States, 
much  more  has  it  the  power  of  prescribing  such 
conditions  of  admission  as  may  be  judged 
reasonable.  The  exercise  of  this  power,  until 
now,  has  never  been  questioned.  The  act  of 
1802,  under  which  Ohio  was  admitted  into  the 
Union,  prescribed  the  condition  that  its  Consti 
tution  should  not  be  repugnant  to  the  ordinance 
of  1787.  The  sixth  article  of  that  ordinance 


172  APPENDIX. 

declares,  'there  shall  be  neither  slavery  nor 
involuntary  servitude  in  the  said  Territory, 
otherwise  than  in  the  punishment  of  crimes 
whereof  the  party  shall  have  been  duly  con 
victed.'  The  same  condition  was  imposed  by 
Congress  on  the  people  of  Indiana  and  Illinois. 
These  States  have  all  complied  with  it,  and 
framed  constitutions  excluding  slavery.  Mis 
souri  lies  in  the  same  latitude.  Its  soil,  pro 
ductions,  and  climate  are  the  same,  and  the 
same  principles  of  government  should  be  applied 
to  it.  ... 

' '  The  sovereignty  of  Congress  in  relation  to 
the  States  is  limited  by  specific  grants ;  but, 
in  regard  to  the  Territories,  it  is  unlimited. 
Missouri  was  purchased  with  our  money,  and, 
until  incorporated  into  the  family  of  States,  it 
may  be  sold  for  money.  Can  it  then  be  main 
tained  that  although  we  have  the  power  to 
dispose  of  the  whole  territory,  we  have  no  right 
to  provide  against  the  further  increase  of  slavery 
within  its  limits?  That,  although  we  may 
change  the  political  relation  of  its  free  citizens 
by  transferring  their  country  to  a  foreign  power, 
we  cannot  provide  for  the  gradual  abolition  of 
slavery  within  its  limits,  nor  establish  those 
civil  regulations  which  naturally  SOAV  from  self- 
evident  truth?  No,  sir,  it  cannot;  the  practice 


APPENDIX.  173 

of  nations  and  the  common  sense  of  mankind 
have  long  since  decided  these  questions. 

"  History  will  record  the  decision  of  this  day 
as  exerting  its  influence  for  centuries  to  come 
over  the  population  of  half  our  continent.  If 
we  reject  the  amendment  and  suffer  this  evil, 
now  easily  eradicated,  to  strike  its  roots  so  deep 
in  the  soil  that  it  can  never  be  removed,  shall 
we  not  furnish  some  apology  for  doubting  our 
sincerity  when  we  deplore  its  existence?  shall 
we  not  expose  ourselves  to  the  same  kind  of 
censure  which  was  pronounced  by  the  Saviour 
of  mankind  upon  the  Scribes  and  Pharisees,  who 
builded  the  tombs  of  the  prophets  and  garnished 
the  sepulchres  of  the  righteous,  and  said,  if 
they  had  lived  in  the  days  of  their  fathers,  they 
would  not  have  been  partakers  with  them  in  the 
blood  of  the  prophets,  while  they  manifested 
a  spirit  which  clearly  proved  them  the  legitimate 
descendants  of  those  who  killed  the  prophets, 
and  thus  filled  up  the  measure  of  their  fathers' 
iniquity?  .  .  . 

"  Now,  whence  came  the  people  who,  with  a 
rapidity  never  before  witnessed,  have  changed 
the  wilderness  between  the  Ohio  and  the  Missis 
sippi  into  fruitful  fields?  who  have  erected 
there,  in  a  period  almost  too  short  for  the 
credibility  of  future  ages,  three  of  the  freest 


174  APPENDIX. 

and  most  flourishing  States  in  our  Union  ?  They 
came  from  the  eastern  hive :  from  that  source 
of  population  which,  in  the  same  time,  has 
added  more  than  one  hundred  thousand  inhabi 
tants  to  my  native  State,  and  furnished  seamen 
for  a  large  portion  of  the  navigation  of  the 
world  :  seamen  who  have  unfurled  your  banner 
in  every  port  to  which  the  enterprise  of  man 
has  gained  admittance,  and  who,  though  poor 
themselves,  have  drawn  rich  treasures  for  the 
nation  from  the  bosom  of  the  deep.  Do  you 
believe  that  these  people  will  settle  in  a  country 
where  they  must  rank  with  negro  slaves? 
Having  neither  the  ability  nor  the  will  to  hold 
slaves  themselves,  they  labor  cheerfully  while 
labor  is  honorable ;  make  it  disgraceful,  they 
will  despise  it.  You  cannot  degrade  it  more 
effectually  than  by  establishing  a  system  where 
by  it  shall  be  performed  principally  by  slaves." 

I  have  given  these  short  extracts  as  they  state 
faithfully  the  logic  and  sentiment  of  the  argument 
in  favor  of  the  famous  amendment. 

The  amendment  was  agreed  to  ;  seventy-nine 
voting  for  it  and  sixty-seven  against  it. 

The  bill  came  up  the  next  day  before  the 
House,  being  reported  by  the  Committee  of  the 
Whole.  Every  thing  was  agreed  to  at  once,  save 
Tallmadge's  amendment,  which  was  discussed 


APPENDIX.  175 

at  length.  Mr.  Scott,  of  Missouri,  made  a 
vigorous  protest  against  the  amendment.  He 
entertained  the  opinion  that,  under  the  Consti 
tution,  Congress  had  not  the  power  to  impose 
this  or  any  other  restriction,  or  to  require  of 
the  people  of  Missouri  their  assent  to  this 
condition  as  a  prerequisite  to  their  admission 
into  the  Union.  He  contended  this  from  the 
language  of  the  Constitution  itself;  from  the 
practice  in  the  admission  of  new  States  under 
that  instrument ;  and  from  the  express  terms  of 
the  treaty  of  cession.  By  the  third  article  of 
that  treaty  of  cession  it  was  stipulated  that  "  the 
inhabitants  of  the  ceded  territory  shall  be  incor 
porated  in  the  Union  of  the  United  States,  and 
admitted,  as  soon  as  possible,  according  to  the 
principles  of  the  Federal  Constitution,  to  the 
enjoyment  of  all  the  rights,  advantages,  and 
immunities  of  citizens  of  the  United  States, 
and,  in  the  meantime,  they  shall  be  maintained 
and  protected  in  the  free  enjoyment  of  their 
liberty,  property,  and  the  religion  which  they 
profess."  "The  people  of  Missouri,"  said  Mr. 
Scott,  "  are,  if  admitted  into  the  Union,  to  come 
in  on  an  equal  footing  with  the  original  States. 
The  people  of  the  other  States  had  the  right  to 
regulate  their  own  internal  police,  to  prescribe 
the  rules  of  their  own  conduct,  and,  in  the 


176  APPENDIX. 

formation  of  their  constitutions,  to  say  whether 
slavery  was  or  was  not  admissible.  How,  then, 
are  the  citizens  of  Missouri  placed  on  an  equal 
footing  with  the  other  members  of  the  Union  ? 
They  are  to  be  bound  down  by  onerous  con 
ditions,  limitations,  and  restrictions,  to  which  I 
know  they  will  not  submit."  The  debate  con 
tinued  at  length,  being  carried  on  by  Mr.  Storrs, 
of  New  York ;  Mr.  Holmes,  of  Massachusetts  ; 
Mr.  Colston,  of  Virginia;  and  Mr.  Spencer, 
of  New  York.  Mr.  Tallmadge,  the  mover  of 
the  amendment,  closed  the  debate.  After 
referring  to  the  violent  language  used  by  some 
members,  the  threats  of  war  and  disunion  in 
which  some  had  indulged,  he  said :  "  Sir, 
language  of  this  sort  has  no  effect  on  me  ;  my 
purpose  is  fixed,  it  is  interwoven  with  my 
existence,  its  durability  is  limited  with  my  life  ; 
it  is  a  great  and  glorious  cause,  setting  bounds 
to  a  slavery  the  most  cruel  and  debasing  the 
world  ever  witnessed ;  it  is  the  freedom  of  man  ; 
it  is  the  cause  of  unredeemed  and  unregenerated 
human  beings.  Sir,  if  a  dissolution  of  the 
Union  must  take  place,  let  it  be  so.  If  civil 
war,  which  gentlemen  so  much  threaten,  must 
come,  I  can  only  say,  let  it  come.  My  hold  on 
life  is  probably  as  frail  as  that  of  any  man  who 
now  hears  me ;  but,  while  that  hold  lasts,  it 


APPENDIX.  177 

shall  be  devoted  to  the  service  of  my  country 
—  to  the  freedom  of  man.  If  blood  is  necessary 
to  extinguish  any  fire  which  I  have  assisted  to 
kindle,  I  can  assure  gentlemen,  while  I  regret 
the  necessity,  I  shall  not  forbear  to  contribute 
my  mite.  Sir,  the  violence  to  which  gentlemen 
have  resorted  on  this  subject  will  not  move  my 
purpose,  nor  drive  me  from  my  place.  I  have 
the  fortune  and  the  honor  to  stand  here  as  the 
representative  of  freemen,  who  possess  intelli 
gence  to  know  their  rights,  who  have  the  spirit 
to  maintain  them.  I  know  the  will  of  my 
constituents,  and,  regardless  of  consequences, 
I  will  avow  it;  as  their  representative,  I  will 
proclaim  their  hatred  to  slavery  in  every  shape. 
As  their  representative,  here  will  I  hold  my 
stand,  until  this  floor,  with  the  Constitution  of 
my  country  which  supports  it,  shall  sink  beneath 

me 

"  Look  down  the  long  vista  of  futurity.  See 
your  empire,  in  extent  unequalled ;  in  advan 
tageous  situation  without  a  parallel ;  and  occupy 
ing  all  the  valuable  part  of  our  continent. 
Behold  this  extended  empire,  inhabited  by  the 
hardy  sons  of  American  freemen  —  knowing 
their  rights,  and  inheriting  the  will  to  protect 
them  —  owners  of  the  soil  on  which  they  live, 
and  interested  in  the  institutions  which  they 


178  APPENDIX. 

labor  to  defend  —  with  two  oceans  laving  your 
shores  ;  and,  tributary  to  your  purposes,  bearing 
on  their  bosoms  the  commerce  of  your  people. 
Compared  to  yours,  the  governments  of  Europe 
dwindle  into  insignificance,  and  the  whole  world 
is  without  a  parallel.  But,  sir,  reverse  this 
scene  ;  people  this  fair  dominion  with  the  slaves 
of  your  planters  ;  extend  slavery  —  this  bane  of 
man,  this  abomination  of  heaven  —  over  your 
extended  empire,  and  you  prepare  its  dissolu 
tion  ;  you  turn  its  accumulated  strength  into 
positive  weakness  ;  you  cherish  a  canker  in  your 
breast ;  you  put  poison  in  your  bosom ;  you 
place  a  vulture  on  your  heart  —  nay,  you  whet 
the  dagger  and  place  it  in  the  hands  of  a  portion 
of  your  population,  stimulated  to  use  it  by 
every  tie,  human  and  divine.  Your  enemies 
will  learn  the  source  and  the  cause  of  your 
weakness.  As  often  as  internal  dangers  shall 
threaten,  or  internal  commotions  await  you, 
•you  will  then  realize  that,  by  your  own  pro 
curement,  you  have  placed  amidst  your  families, 
and  in  the  bosom  of  your  country,  a  population 
producing  at  once  the  greatest  cause  of  indi 
vidual  danger  and  of  national  weakness.  With 
this  defect,  your  government  must  crumble  to 
pieces,  and  your  people  become  the  scoff  of  the 
world." 


APPENDIX.  179 

In  taking  the  vote,  the  amendment  was  divided. 
The  first  part  was  carried  87  to  76,  and  the 
latter  part  was  carried  82  to  78.  So  the  whole 
amendment  was  agreed  to.  And  the  bill  was 
ordered  to  be  engrossed  by  a  vote  of  97  yeas  to 
56  nays.  The  bill  then  went  to  the  Senate. 
Certain  amendments  were  added  in  that  branch, 
but  the  amendment  regarding  slavery  was 
stricken  out.  The  bill  then  went  back  to  the 
House  minus  that  clause,  but  with  other  amend 
ments  annexed.  The  two  Houses  could  not 
agree,  each  adhering  to  its  position,  and  the 
bill  failed  to  become  a  law.  Thus  ended  the 
Missouri  legislation  at  that  session  of  Congress. 
It  will  be  noticed  how  strong  was  the  anti-slavery 
sentiment  in  the  House,  though  abolitionism 
had  not  then  become  a  national  question.  The 
anti-slavery  agitation  was  not  then  arousing  the 
country.  Members  had  not  been  elected  on 
that  issue.  Yet  the  temper  of  the  House  was 
for  freedom,  and  the  boldness  of  the  speeches 
of  Northern  (notably  New  York)  members  was 
in  striking  contrast  with  the  timidity  shown  by 
their  successors  in  later  years. 

Dec.  8,  1819,  at  the  first  session  of  the  Six 
teenth  Congress,  on  motion  of  Mr.  Scott,  the 
several  memorials  of  the  Legislature  of  the  Ter 
ritory  of  Missouri  and  of  the  inhabitants  ot  the 


180  APPENDIX. 

said  Territory,  presented  to  the  House  at  the 
last  session  of  Congress,  relative  to  the  admis 
sion  of  that  Territory  into  the  Union,  as  a  sep 
arate  and  independent  State  were  referred  to  a 
select  committee.  The  next  day  Mr.  Scott 
reported  a  bill  from  the  committee.  On  the 
first  of  March  the  bill  was  read  the  third  time 
and  the  question  stated,  "  Shall  the  bill  pass?" 
Mr.  Randolph,  of  Virginia,  spoke  against  the 
bill  at  great  length,  on  the  ground  of  the  un 
constitutional  and  unjust  restriction  which  it 
imposed  on  the  people  of  Missouri,  as  a  condi 
tion  of  their  admission  into  the  Union.  The 
bill  passed  the  House,  ninety-one  to  eighty-two, 
and  went  to  the  Senate.  At  that  time  there 
was  pending  in  the  Senate,  the  House  bill  ad 
mitting  Maine  into  the  Union.  When  that  bill 
was  reported  in  the  Senate  from  the  committee 
to  which  it  had  been  referred,  it  had  tacked  to 
it  as  an  amendment,  the  whole  of  the  bill 
authorizing  the  people  of  Missouri  to  form  a 
constitution  without  any  slavery  restriction. 
Mr.  Roberts,  of  Pennsylvania,  then  moved:  — 
ff  That  the  bill  for  the  admission  of  the  State 
of  Maine  into  the  Union,  and  the  amendment 
thereto  reported,  he  recommitted  to  the  Judi 
ciary  Committee,  with  instructions  so  to  modify 
its  provisions  as  to  admit  the  State  of  Maine  into 


APPENDIX.  181 

the  Union,"  (divested  of  the  amendment  embra 
cing  Missouri). 

This  opened  the  debate  in  earnest.  And 
motions  and  substitutes  followed  in  quick  suc 
cession.  It  was  a  long  debate  and  graced  by 
many  noble  utterances.  The  most  notable 
speech  in  the  Senate  was  that  of  William  Pinck- 
ney,  of  Maryland  —  William  Pinckney,  whom 
Theophilus  Parsons  styled  the  greatest  lawyer 
the  American  bar  had  ever  possessed.  Pinck 
ney  had  come  to  the  Senate  crowned  with  the 
laurels  of  the  forum.  The  senate  chamber  was 
crowded.  The  talent,  the  taste  and  beauty  of 
the  land  were  there.  All  business  was  sus 
pended  in  the  House  of  Representatives,  and 
members  rushed  into  the  upper  chamber.  His 
speech  was  a  brilliant  combination  of  eloquence 
and  argument,  beauty  and  strength,  amplitude 
and  condensation.  Pinckney  sowed  his  argu 
ments  broadcast.  His  speech  is  the  best  state 
ment  of  the  South  side  view  of  the  Missouri 
Compromise.  His  central  idea  was  that  you 
must  make  the  Union  as  to  the  new  States  what 
it  is  to  the  old.  He  treated  the  question  from  a 
purely  constitutional  standpoint.  Beginning 
with  a  brilliant  exordium,  he  directed  his  atten 
tion  at  once  to  the  question  before  the  Senate. 

"  Sir,  it  was  but  the  other  day  that  we  were 


182  APPENDIX. 

forbidden  (properly  forbidden,  I  am  sure,  for 
the  prohibition  came  from  you),  to  assume  that 
there  existed  any  intention  to  impose  a  prospec 
tive  restraint  on  the  domestic  legislation  of 
Missouri  —  a  restraint  to  act  upon  it  contempo 
raneously  with  its  origin  as  a  State,  and  to  con 
tinue  adhesive  to  it  through  all  the  stages  of  its 

o  o 

political  existence.  We  are  now,  however, 
permitted  to  know  that  it  is  determined  by  a 
sort  of  political  surgery  to  amputate  one  of  the 
limbs  of  its  local  sovereignty,  and  thus  mangled 
and  disparaged,  and  thus  only,  to  receive  it 
into  the  bosom  of  the  constitution.  It  is  now 
avowed  that  while  Maine  is  to  be  ushered  into 
the  Union  with  every  possible  demonstration  of 
studious  reverence  on  our  part,  and  on  hers 
with  colors  flying,  and  all  the  other  graceful  ac 
companiments  of  honorable  triumph,  this  ill-con 
ditioned  upstart  of  the  West,  this  obscure 
foundling  of  a  wilderness  that  was  but  yesterday 
:the  hunting  ground  of  the  savage,  is  to  find  her 
way  into  the  American  family,  as  she  can,  with 
a  humiliating  badge  of  remediless  inferiority 
patched  upon  her  garments,  with  the  mark  of 
recent  qualified  manumission  upon  her,  or  rather 
with  a  brand  upon  her  forehead,  to  tell  the 
story  of  her  territorial  vassalage,  and  to  perpet 
uate  the  memory  of  her  evil  propensities.  It  is 


APPENDIX.  183 

now  avowed,  that  the  robust  District  of  Maine  is 
to  be  seated  by  the  side  of  her  truly  respectable 
parent,  co-ordinate  in  authority  and  honor,  and 
is  to  be  dandled  into  that  power  and  dignity  of 
which  she  does  not  stand  in  need,  but  which  un 
doubtedly  she  deserves.  The  more  infantine 
and  feeble  Missouri  is  to  be  repelled  with  harsh 
ness,  and  forbidden  to  come  at  all,  unless  with 
the  iron  collar  of  servitude  about  her  neck,  in 
stead  of  the  civic  crown  of  republican  freedom 
upon  her  brows,  and  is  to  be  doomed  forever  to 
leading  strings,  unless  she  will  exchange  those 
leading  strings  for  shackles. 

"  I  am  told  that  you  have  the  power  to  estab 
lish  this  odious  and  revolting  distinction,  and  I 
am  referred  for  the  proofs  of  that  power  to 
various  parts  of  the  Constitution,  but  princi 
pally  to  that  part  of  it  which  authorizes  the 
admission  of  new  States  into  the  Union.  I  am 
myself  of  opinion  that  it  is  in  that  part  only  that 
the  advocates  for  this  restriction  can,  with  any 
hope  of  success,  apply  for  a  license  to  oppose  it, 
and  that  the  efforts  which  have  been  made  to 
find  it  in  other  portions  of  that  instrument,  are 
too  desperate  to  require  to  be  encountered.  I 
shall,  however,  examine  those  other  portions 
before  I  have  done,  lest  it  should  be  supposed 
by  those  who  have  relied  upon  them,  that  what 


184  APPENDIX. 

I  omit  to  answer  I  believe  to  be  unanswerable. 
The  clause  of  the  Constitution  which  relates  to 
the  admission  of  new  States,  is  in  these  words : 
r  The  Congress  may  admit  new  States  into  this 
Union/  etc.,  and  the  advocates  for  restriction 
maintain  that  the  use  of  the  word,  '  may,'  im 
ports  discretion  to  admit  or  to  reject :  and  that 
in  this  discretion  is  wrapped  up  another,  —  that 
of  prescribing  the  terms  and  conditions  of  ad 
mission  in  case  you  are  willing  to  admit.  Cujus 
est  dare  ejus  est  disponere.  I  will  not  for  the 
present,  inquire  whether  this  involved  discretion 
to  dictate  the  terms  of  admission  belongs  to  you 
or  not.  It  is  fit  that  I  should  first  look  to  the 
nature  and  extent  of  it.  I  think  I  may  assume, 
that  if  such  a  power  be  anything  but  nominal,  it 
is  much  more  than  adequate  to  the  present 
object ;  that  it  is  a  power  of  vast  expansion,  to 
which  human  sagacity  can  assign  no  reasonable 
limits  ;  that  it  is  a  capacious  reservoir  of  authority, 
from  which  you  may  take,  in  all  time  to  come, 
as  occasion  may  serve,  the  means  of  oppression 
as  well  as  of  benefaction.  I  know  that  it  pro 
fesses  at  this  moment  to  be  the  chosen  instru 
ment  of  protecting  mercy,  and  would  win  upon 
us  by  its  benignant  smiles  :  but  I  know,  too,  it 
can  frown  and  play  the  tyrant,  if  it  be  so  dis 
posed.  Notwithstanding  the  softness  which  it 


APPENDIX.  185 

now  assumes,  and  the  care  with  which  it  con 
ceals  its  giant  proportions  beneath  the  deceitful 
drapery  of  sentiment,  when  it  next  appears  be 
fore  you  it  may  show  itself  with  a  sterner  coun 
tenance,  and  in  more  awful  dimensions.  It  is, 
to  speak  the  truth,  Sir,  a  power  of  colossal  size  : 
if,  indeed,  it  be  not  an  abuse  of  language  to  call 
it  by  the  gentle  name  of  a  power.  Sir,  it  is  a 
wilderness  of  powers,  of  which  fancy,  in  her 
happiest  mood,  is  unable  to  perceive  the  far 
distant  and  shadowy  boundary.  Armed  with 
such  a  power,  with  religion  in  one  hand,  and 
philanthropy  in  the  other,  and  followed  with  a 
goodly  train  of  public  and  private  virtues,  you 
may  achieve  more  conquests  over  sovereignties, 
not  your  own,  than  falls  to  the  common  lot  of 
even  uncommon  ambition.  .  .  .  Slavery,  we 
are  told  is  now  rolling  onward  with  a  rapid 
tide  towards  the  boundless  regions  of  the 
West,  threatening  to  doom  them  to  sterility  and 
sorrow,  unless  some  potent  voice  can  say  to  it, 
'  Thus  far  shalt  thou  go  and  no  farther.'  Slavery 
engenders  pride  and  indolence  in  him  who  com 
mands,  and  inflicts  intellectual  and  moral  deg 
radation  on  him  who  serves.  Slavery,  in  fine, 
is  unchristian  and  abominable.  Sir,  I  shall  not 
stop  to  deny  that  slavery  is  all  this  and  more  : 
but  I  shall  not  think  myself  the  less  authorized 


186  APPENDIX. 

to  deny  that  it  is  for  you  to  stay  the  course  of 
this  dark  torrent,  by  opposing  to  it  a  mound 
raised  up  by  the  labors  of  this  portentous  dis 
cretion  on  the  domain  of  others  :  a  mound  which 
you  cannot  erect  but  through  the  instrument 
ality  of  a  trespass  of  no  ordinary  kind  —  not  the 
comparatively  innocent  trespass  that  beats  down 
a  few  blades  of  grass  which  the  first  kind  sun  or 
the  next  refreshing  shower  may  cause  to  spring 
again  —  but  that  which  levels  with  the  ground 
the  lordliest  trees  of  the  forest,  and  claims  im 
mortality  for  the  destruction  which  it  in 
flicts.  .  .  .  'New  States  may  be  admitted  by 
the  Congress  into  this  Union.'  It  is  objected 
that  the  word  f  may,'  imports  power,  not  obliga 
tion  — a  right  to  decide  —  a  discretion  to  grant 
or  refuse.  To  this  it  might  be  answered,  that 
power  is  duty  on  many  occasions.  But  let  it  be 
conceded  that  it  is  discretionary.  What  conse 
quence  follows?  A  power  to  refuse  in  a  case 
like  this,  does  not  necessarily  involve  a  power 
to  exact  terms.  You  must  look  to  the  result, 
which  is  the  declared  object  of  the  power. 
Whether  you  will  arrive  at  it  or  not  may  depend 
on  your  will :  but  you  cannot  compromise  with 
the  result  intended  and  professed.  What,  then, 
is  the  professed  result  ?  To  admit  a  State  into 
this  Union.  What  is  that  Union?  A  confed- 


APPENDIX.  187 

eration  of  States  equal  in  sovereignty,  capable 
of  everything  which  the  Constitution  does  not 
forbid,  or  authorize  Congress  to  forbid.  It  is 
an  equal  union  between  parties  equally  sovereign. 
They  were  sovereign,  independently  of  the 
Union.  The  object  of  the  Union  was  common 
protection  for  the  exercise  of  already  existing 
sovereignty.  The  parties  gave  up  a  portion  of 
that  sovereignty  to  insure  the  remainder.  As 
far  as  they  gave  it  up  by  the  common  compact 
they  have  ceased  to  be  sovereign.  The  Union 
provides  the  means  of  defending  the  residue  : 
and  it  is  into  that  Union  that  a  new  State  is 
to  come.  By  acceding  to  it,  the  new  State  is 
placed  on  the  same  footing  with  the  original 
States.  It  accedes  for  the  same  purpose,  that 
is,  protection  for  its  unsurrendered  sovereignty. 
If  it  comes  in  shorn  of  its  beams  —  crippled  and 
disparaged  beyond  the  original  States,  it  is  not 
into  the  original  Union  that  it  comes.  For  it  is 
a  different  sort  of  a  Union.  The  first  was 
Union  inter  pares.  This  is  a  Union  between 
disparates,  between  giants  and  a  dwarf,  be 
tween  power  and  feebleness,  between  full  pro 
portioned  sovereignties  and  a  miserable  image 
of  power  —  a  thing  which  that  very  Union  has 
shrunk  and  shrivelled  from  its  just  size,  instead 
of  preserving  it  in  its  true  dimensions.  It  is 


188  APPENDIX. 

into  'this  Union,'  that  is,  the  Union  of  the  Fed 
eral  Constitution,  that  you  are  to  admit  or 
refuse  to  admit.  You  can  admit  into  no  other. 
You  cannot  make  the  Union,  as  to  the  new 
State,  what  it  is  not  as  to  the  old :  for  then  it 
is  not  this  Union  that  you  open  for  the  entrance 
of  a  new  party.  If  you  make  it  enter  into  a 
new  and  additional  compact,  is  it  any  longer  the 
same  Union  ?  ...  Is  the  right  to  hold  slaves  a 
right  which  Massachusetts  enjoys?  If  it  is, 
Massachusetts  is  under  this  Union  in  a  different 
character  from  Missouri.  The  power  of  Con 
gress  is  different  —  everything  which  depends 
upon  the  Union,  is  in  that  respect,  different. 

"  But  it  is  immaterial  whether  you  legislate 
for  Missouri  as  a  State  or  not.  The  effect  of 
your  legislation  is  to  bring  it  into  the  Union 
with  a  portion  of  its  sovereignty  taken  away. 

"  It  is  said  that  the  word  may,  necessarily  im 
plies  the  right  of  prescribing  the  terms  of 
admission.  Those  who  maintain  this  are  aware 
that  there  are  no  express  words  (such  as,  upon 
such  terms  and  conditions  as  Congress  shall 
think  fit),  words  which  it  was  natural  to  expect 
to  find  in  the  Constitution,  if  the  effect  intended 
for  was  meant.  They  put  it,  therefore,  on  the 
word  may,  and  on  that  alone. 

"  Give  to  that  word  all  the  force  you  please, 


APPENDIX.  189 

what  docs  it  import?  That  Congress  is  not 
bound  to  admit  a  new  State  into  this  Union. 
Be  it  so  for  argument's  sake.  Does  it  follow 
that  when  you  consent  to  admit  into  this  Union, 
a  new  State,  you  can  make  it  less  in  sovereign 
power  than  the  original  parties  to  that  Union  : 
that  you  can  make  the  Union  as  to  it,  what  it  is 
not  to  them :  that  you  can  fashion  it  to  your 
liking  by  compelling  it  to  purchase  admission 
into  a  Union,  by  sacrificing  a  portion  of  that 
power  which  it  is  the  sole  purpose  of  the  Union 
to  maintain  in  all  the  plenitude  which  the  Union 
itself  does  not  impair  ?  Does  it  follow  that  you 
can  force  upon  it  an  additional  compact  not 
found  in  the  compact  of  Union  :  that  you  can 
make  it  come  into  the  Union  less  a  State,  in  re 
gard  to  sovereign  power,  than  its  fellows  in  that 
Union  :  that  you  can  cripple  its  legislative  com 
petency  (beyond  the  Constitution,  which  is  the 
part  of  Union,  to  which  you  make  it  a  party  as 
if  it  had  originally  been  a  party  to  it),  by  what 
you  choose  to  call  a  condition ,  but  which,  what 
ever  it  may  be  called,  brings  the  new  govern 
ment  into  the  Union,  under  new  obligations  to 
it,  and  with  disparaged  powers  to  be  protected 
by  it? 

"  I  have  thus  endeavored  to  show  that  even 
if  you  have  a  discretion  to  refuse  to  admit,  you 


190  APPENDIX. 

have  no  discretion,  if  you  are  willing  to  admit, 
to  insist  upon  any  terms  that  impair  the  sover 
eignty  of  the  admitted  State,  as  it  would  other 
wise  stand  in  the  Union  by  the  Constitution 
which  receives  it  into  its  bosom.  To  admit  or 
not,  is  for  you  to  decide.  Admission  once  con 
ceded,  it  follows  as  a  corollary  that  you  must 
take  the  new  State  as  an  equal  companion  with 
its  fellows :  that  you  cannot  recast  or  new- 
model  the  Union  pro  hac  vice:  but  that  you 
must  receive  it  into  the  actual  Union,  and  recog 
nize  it  as  a  parcener  in  the  common  inheritance, 
without  any  other  shackles  than  the  rest  have, 
by  the  Constitution,  submitted  to  bear,  without 
any  other  extinction  of  power  than  is  the  work 
of  the  Constitution  acting  indifferently  upon  all. 
"A  territory  cannot  surrender  to  Congress  by 
anticipation,  the  whole  or  any  part,  of  the  sover 
eign  power,  wrhich,  by  the  Constitution  of  the 
Union,  wrill  belong  to  it  when  it  becomes  a  State 
and  a  member  of  the  Union.  Its  consent,  is 
therefore  nothing.  It  is  under  the  government 

o  o 

of  Congress  :  if  it  can  barter  away  a  part  of  its 
sovereignty,  by  anticipation,  it  can  do  so  as  to  the 
whole  :  for  where  will  you  stop  ?  If  it  does  not 
cease  to  be  a  State,  in  the  sense  of  the  Constitu 
tion,  with  only  a  certain  portion  of  sovereign 
power,  what  other  smaller  portion  will  have  that 


APPENDIX.  191 

effect  ?  If  you  depart  from  the  standard  of  the 
Constitution,  that  is,  the  quantity  of  domestic 
sovereignty  left  in  the  first  contracting  States, 
and  secured  by  the  original  compact  of  Union, 
where  will  you  get  another  standard  ?  Consent 
is  no  standard  :  for  consent  may  be  gained  to  a 
surrender  of  all. 

"  Sir,  if  we  too  closely  look  to  the  rise  and 
progress  of  long-sanctioned  establishments  and 
unquestioned  rights,  we  may  discover  other  sub 
jects  than  that  of  slavery  with  which  fraud  and 
violence  may  claim  a  fearful  connection,  and 
over  which  it  may  be  our  interest  to  throw  the 
mantle  of  oblivion.  What  was  the  settlement 
of  our  ancestors  in  this  country  but  an  invasion 
of  the  rights  of  the  barbarians  who  inhabited  it  ? 
That  settlement,  with  slight  exception,  was 
effected  by  the  slaughter  of  those  who  did  no 
more  than  defend  their  native  land  against  the 
intruders  of  Europe,  or  by  unequal  compacts 
and  purchases,  in  which  feebleness  and  ignorance 
had  to  deal  with  power  and  cunning.  The  sav 
ages  who  once  built  their  huts  where  this  proud 
Capitol,  rising  from  its  recent  ashes,  exempli 
fies  the  sovereignty  of  the  American  people, 
were  swept  away  by  the  injustice  of  our  fathers 
and  their  domain  usurped  by  force,  or  obtained 
by  artifices  yet  more  criminal.  Our  continent 


192  APPENDIX. 

was  full  of  those  aboriginal  inhabitants.  Where 
are  they  or  their  descendants?  Either  'with 
years  beyond  the  flood,'  or  driven  back  by  the 
swelling  tide  of  our  population  from  the  borders 
of  the  Atlantic  to  the  deserts  of  the  West. 
You  follow  still  the  miserable  remnants,  and 
make  contracts  with  them  that  seal  their  ruin. 
You  purchase  their  lands,  of  which  they  know 
not  the  value,  in  order  that  you  may  sell  them 
to  advantage,  increase  your  treasure,  and  en 
large  your  empire.  Yet  further :  you  pursue 
as  they  retire  ;  and  they  must  continue  to  retire 
until  the  Pacific  shall  stay  their  retreat,  and 
compel  them  to  pass  away  as  a  dream.  Will 
you  recur  to  those  scenes  of  various  iniquity  for 
any  other  purpose  than  to  regret  and  lament 
them  ?  Will  you  pry  into  them  with  a  view  to 
shake  and  impair  your  rights  of  property  and 
domain?  .  .  . 

The  power  is,  f  to  admit  new  States  into  this 
Union ' :  and  it  may  be  safely  conceded  that  here 
is  discretion  to  admit  or  refuse.  The  question  is, 
what  must  we  do,  if  we  do  anything?  What 
must  we  admit,  and  into  what?  The  answer  is, 
a  State  —  and  into  this  Union.  The  distinction 
between  Federal  rights  and  local  rights  is  an 
idle  distinction.  Because  the  new  State  acquires 
Federal  rights,  it  is  not,  therefore,  in  the 


APPENDIX.  193 

Union.  The  Union  is  a  compact :  and  is  it  an 
equal  party  to  that  compact,  because  it  has  equal 
Federal  rights  ?  How  is  the  Union  formed  ?  By 
equal  contributions  of  power.  Make  one 
member  sacrifice  more  than  another,  and  it 
becomes  unequal.  The  compact  is  of  two  parts  : 
1.  The  thing  obtained  —  federal  rights  ;  2.  The 
price  paid — local  sovereignty. 

rr  You  may  disturb  the  balance  of  the  Union, 
either  by  diminishing  the  thing  acquired,  or  in 
creasing  the  sacrifice  paid.  What  were  the 
purposes  of  coming  into  the  Union  among  the 
original  States?  The  States  were  originally 
sovereign,  without  limit,  as  to  foreign  and  do 
mestic  concerns.  But  being  incapable  of  pro 
tecting  themselves  singly,  they  entered  into  the 
Union  to  defend  themselves  against  foreign 
violence.  The  domestic  concerns  of  the  people 
were  not,  in  general,  to  be  acted  on  by  it.  The 
security  of  the  power  of  managing  them  by 
domestic  legislature,  is  one  of  the  great  objects 
of  the  Union.  The  Union  is  a  means,  not  an 
end.  By  requiring  greater  sacrifices  of  domestic 
power,  the  end  is  sacrificed  to  the  means. 
Suppose  the  surrender  of  all,  or  nearly  all,  the 
domestic  powers  of  legislation  were  required  : 
the  means  would  there  have  swallowed  up  the 
end." 


194  APPENDIX. 

The  opponents  of  slavery  had  argued  that 
the  restriction  against  involuntary  servitude 
should  be  introduced,  because  slavery  was  un- 
Eepublican  and  the  Constitution  guaranteed  a 
Republican  form  of  government  to  every  State. 
On  this  branch  of  the  argument  Mr.  Pinckney 
spoke  as  follows:  "The  government  of  a  new 
State,  as  well  as  of  an  old  State,  must,  I  agree, 
be  Republican  in  its  form.  But  it  has  not  been 
very  clearly  explained  what  the  laws  which  such 
a  Government  may  enact  can  have  to  do  with 
its  form.  The  form  of  the  Government  is  ma 
terial  only  as  it  furnishes  a  security  that  those 
laws  will  protect  and  promote  the  public  happi 
ness,  and  be  made  in  a  Republican  spirit.  The 
people  being,  in  such  a  Government,  the  foun 
tain  of  all  power,  and  their  servants  being 
periodically  responsible  to  them  for  its  exercise, 
the  Constitution  of  the  Union  takes  for  granted, 
(except  so  far  as  it  imposes  limitations),  that 
every  such  exercise  will  be  just  and  salutary. 
The  introduction  or  continuance  of  civil  slavery 
is  manifestly  the  mere  result  of  the  power  of 
making  laws.  It  does  not  in  any  degree  enter 
into  the  form  of  government.  It  pre-supposes 
that  form  already  settled,  and  takes  its  rise  not 
from  the  particular  frame  of  the  government, 
but  the  general  power  which  every  government 


APPENDIX.  195 

involves.  Make  the  government  what  you  will 
in  its  organization  and  in  the  distribution  of  its 
authorities,  the  introduction  or  continuance  of 
involuntary  servitude  by  the  legislative  power 
which  it  has  created,  can  have  no  influence  on 
its  pre-established  form,  whether  monarchical, 
aristocratical,  or  republican.  The  form  of  gov 
ernment  is  still  one  thing,  and  the  law,  being 
a  simple  exertion  of  the  ordinary  faculty  of  leg 
islation  by  those  to  whom  that  form  of  govern 
ment  has  entrusted  it,  another.  The  gentlemen, 
however,  identify  an  act  of  legislation,  sanction^ 
ing  involuntary  servitude,  with  the  form  of 
government  itself,  and  they  assure  us  that  the 
latter  is  changed  retroactively  by  the  first,  and 
is  no  longer  Republican. 

"  But  if  a  Republican  form  of  government  is 
that  in  which  all  the  men  have  a  share  in  the 
public  power,  the  slaveholding  States  will  not 
alone  retire  from  the  Union.  The  constitutions 
of  some  of  the  other  States  do  not  sanction  uni 
versal  suffrage,  or  universal  eligibility.  They 
require  citizenship,  and  age,  and  a  certain 
amount  of  property,  to  give  a  title  to  vote  or  to 
be  voted  for :  and  they  who  have  not  these 
qualifications  are  just  as  much  disfranchised, 
with  regard  to  the  government  and  its  power, 
as  if  they  were  slaves.  They  have  civil  rights, 


196  APPENDIX. 

indeed,  (and  so  have  slaves  in  a  less  degree) 
but  they  have  no  share  in  the  government." 

He  then  discussed  at  length  the  clause  of  the 
Constitution,  relating  to  the  migration  or  impor 
tation,  before  the  year  1808,  of  such  persons  as 
any  of  the  States  then  existing,  should  think 
proper  to  admit ;  and  closed  his  speech  by 
expressing  a  hope  that  (what  he  deemed)  the 
perilous  principles  urged  by  those  in  favor  of 
the  restriction  upon  the  new  State,  would  be 
disavowed  or  explained,  or  that,  at  all  events, 
the  application  of  them  to  the  subject  under 
discussion  would  not  be  pressed,  but  that  it 
might  be  disposed  of  in  a  manner  satisfactory 
to  all,  by  a  prospective  prohibition  of  slavery  in 
the  territory  to  the  North  and  West  of  Missouri. 
Mr.  Pinckney's  remarks  had  left  a  deep  impres 
sion  on  every  one.  His  speech  was  declared 
far  superior  to  that  of  Rufus  King,  to  whose 
arguments  Pinckney  had  given  most  of  his 
attention.  The  South  had  stated  her  position 
on  the  great  question  through  the  lips  of  the 
nation's  greatest  lawyer.  No  one  rose  to  reply, 
and  Mr.  Otis,  of  Massachusetts,  moved  an 
adjournment,  which  was  carried.  This  was 
February  15.  On  the  17th,  the  vote  was  taken 
on  the  bill.  The  amendment  of  Mr.  Thomas, 
of  Illinois,  was  as  follows:  — 


APPENDIX.  197 

"  And  be  it  further  enacted,  That  in  all  that 
territory  ceded  by  France  to  the  United  States, 
under  the  name  of  Louisiana,  which  lies  north 
of  thirty-six  degrees  and  thirty  minutes  north 
latitude,  excepting  only  such  part  thereof  as  is 
included  within  the  limits  of  the  State  contem 
plated  by  this  act,  slavery  and  involuntary 
servitude,  otherwise  than  in  the  punishment  of 
crimes  whereof  the  party  shall  have  been  duly 
convicted,  shall  be  and  is  forever  prohibited. 
Provided  always,  That  any  person  escaping 
into  the  same,  from  whom  labor  or  service  is 
lawfully  claimed  in  any  State  or  territory  of  the 
United  States,  such  fugitive  may  be  lawfully 
reclaimed,  and  conveyed  to  the  person  claiming 
his  or  her  labor  or  service  as  aforesaid."  This 
amendment  was  adopted  by  a  vote  of  thirty-four 
to  ten.  The  bill  was  then  engrossed  and  read 
a  third  time.  The  bill  as  amended  then  went 
to  the  House.  And  on  February  23,  the  House 
disagreed  to  those  amendments  which  incor 
porated  the  admission  of  Missouri  in  the  bill 
admitting  Maine.  And  then  the  House  rejected 
all  the  amendments  to  the  bill  admitting  Maine. 
The  Senate  was  equally  firm  and  refused  to 
recede  from  its  amendments.  A  committee  of 
conference  was  then  appointed.  It  will  be 
remembered  the  Missouri  bill  which  had  passed 


198  APPENDIX. 

the  House  was  now  in  the  Senate.  On  March 
2,  a  message  from  the  Senate  announced  the 
passage  of  the  Missouri  bill  (with  the  Thomas 
and  Storrs  amendment  excluding  slavery  from 
the  territory  west  of  the  Mississippi,  north  of 
thirty-six  degrees  thirty  minutes  north  latitude, 
except  within  the  proposed  State  of  Missouri). 
The  same  day  the  managers  of  the  conference 
recommended  the  Senate  to  recede  from  its 
amendments  to  the  said  Maine  bill,  and  both 
houses  to  strike  out  from  the  Missouri  bill 
(originating  in  the  House)  the  section  excluding 
slavery,  and  insert  thereof  the  Thomas  amend 
ment  above  referred  to.  This  accommodation 
was  agreed  to,  and  the  Missouri  bill  thus 
amended  passed  both  Houses.  The  bill  to  admit 
Maine  was  approved  March  3,  1820.  The  act 
to  authorize  the  people  of  Missouri  Territory  to 
form  a  Constitution  and  State  government,  and 
for  the  admission  of  such  State  into  the  Union 
on  an  equal  footing  with  the  original  States, 
and  to  prohibit  slavery  in  certain  territories, 
was  approved  March  6,  1820.  And  thus  ended 
the  famous  struggle.  And  in  this  manner  did 
our  ancestors  enter  into  a  solemn  agreement 
prohibiting  slavery  north  of  thirty-six  degrees 
thirty  minutes  north  latitude  in  the  territory 
ceded  us  by  France,  under  the  name  of  Louis- 


APPENDIX.  199 

iana,  save  that  part  admitted  under  the  name 
of  Missouri.  They  thought  the  question  settled. 
They  never  supposed  that  solemn  treaty  would 
be  broken.  Alas  !  they  knew  not  the  corrupting 
power  of  slaver}\  That  was  left  for  their 
posterity  to  learn  in  blood ! 


II. 

SUMNER'S  EULOGY. 

Remarks  of  Charles  Sumner  in  the  United  States  Senate. 
December  18,  1868. 

;r  THE  visitor,  as  he  paces  the  corridor  leading 
to  the  House  of  Commons,  stops  with  reverence 
before  the  marble  statues  of  the  men  who, 
during  two  centuries  of  English  history,  adorned 
that  famous  chamber.  There  are  twelve  in  all, 
each  speaking  to  the  memory  as  he  spoke  in 
life  ;  beginning  with  the  learned  Selden  and  the 
patriot  Hampden  ;  with  Falkland,  so  sweet  and 
loyal  in  character  ;  Sorners,  so  great  as  a  defender 
of  constitutional  liberty ;  and  embracing  in  the 
historic  group  the  silver-tongued  Murray ;  the 
two  Pitts,  father  and  son ;  Fox,  always  first  in 
debate;  and  that  orator  whose  speeches  con 
tribute  to  the  wealth  of  English  literature, 
Edmund  Burke. 

"In  the  lapse  of  time,  as  our  history  extends, 
similar  monuments  may  illustrate  the  approach 
to  our  House  of  Representatives,  arresting  the 
reverence  of  the  visitor.  If  our  group  is  confined 
to  those  whose  fame  has  been  won  in  the  House 

200 


APPENDIX.  201 

alone,  it  will  be  small ;  for  members  of  the 
House  are  mostly  birds  of  passage  only  perching 
on  their  way  to  another  place.  Few  remain  so 
as  to  become  identified  with  the  House,  or  their 
service  there  is  forgotten  in  the  blaze  of  other 
service  elsewhere,  as  was  the  case  with  Madison, 
Marshall,  Clay,  Webster  and  Lincoln.  It  is  not 
difficult  to  see  who  will  find  a  place  in  this  small 
company.  There  must  be  a  statue  of  Josiah 
Quincy,  whose  series  of  eloquent  speeches  is  the 
most  complete  of  our  history  before  Webster 
pleaded  for  Greece  ;  and  also  a  statue  of  Joshua 
E.  Giddings,  whose  faithful  championship  of  free 
dom  throughout  a  long  and  terrible  conflict, 
makes  him  one  of  the  great  names  of  our  country. 
And  there  must  be  a  statue  of  Thaddeus  Stevens, 
who  was,  perhaps,  the  most  remarkable  charac 
ter  identified  with  the  House,  unless  we  except 
John  Quincy  Adams  ;  but  the  fame  of  the  latter 
is  not  that  of  a  representative  alone,  for  he  was 
already  illustrious  from  various  service  before 
he  entered  the  House. 

"All  of  these  hated  slavery,  and  labored  for  its 
overthrow.  On  this  account  they  were  a  mark 
for  obloquy,  and  were  generally  in  a  minority. 
Already  compensation  has  begun.  As  the  cause 
which  they  upheld  so  bravely  is  exalted,  so  is 
their  fame.  By  the  side  of  their  far-sighted, 


202  APPENDIX. 

far-reaching  and  heroic  efforts,  how  diminutive 
is  all  that  was  done  by  others  at  the  time  !  How 
vile  the  spirit  that  raged  against  them  ! 

"  Stevens  was  a  child  of  New  England,  as 

o 

were  Quincy  and  Adams  ;  but  after  completing 
his  education  he  found  a  home  in  Pennsylvania, 
which  had  already  given  birth  to  Giddings.  If 
this  great  central  State  can  claim  one  of  these 
remarkable  men  by  adoption  only,  it  may  claim 
the  other  by  paternity.  Their  names  are  among 
its  best  glories. 

"Two  things  Stevens  did  for  his  adopted 
State,  by  which  he  repaid  largely  all  her  hospi 
tality  and  favor.  He  taught  her  to  cherish 
education  for  the  people,  and  he  taught  her 
respect  for  human  rights.  The  latter  lesson  was 
slower  learned  than  the  former.  In  the  prime 
of  life,  when  his  faculties  were  in  their  highest 
vigor,  he  became  conspicuous  for  earnest  effort, 
crowned  by  most  persuasive  speech,  whose 
echoes  have  not  yet  died  away,  for  those  common 
schools,  which,  more  even  than  railroads,  are  the 
hand-maids  of  civilization,  besides  being  the  true 
support  of  republican  government.  His  power 
ful  word  turned  the  scale,  and  a  great  cause  was 
won.  This  same  powerful  word  was  given 
promptly  and  without  hesitation  to  that  other 
cause,  suffering  then  from  constant  and  most 


APPENDIX.  203 

cruel  outrage.  Here  he  stood  always  like  a 
pillar.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  he  was  one  of  the 
earliest  of  abolitionists,  accepting  the  name  and 
bearing  the  reproach.  Not  a  child  in  Penn 
sylvania,  conning  a  spelling-book  beneath  the 
humble  rafters  of  a  village  school,  who  does  not 
owre  him  gratitude ;  not  a  citizen,  rejoicing  in 
that  security  which  is  found  only  in  liberal 
institutions,  founded  on  the  equal  rights  of  all, 
who  is  not  his  debtor. 

"  When  he  entered  Congress  it  was  as  cham 
pion.  His  conclusions  were  already  matured, 
and  he  saw  his  duty  plain  before  him.  The 
English  poet  foreshadows  him  when  he  pictures — 

'  One  in  whom  persuasion  and  belief 
Had  ripened  into  faith,  and  faith  become 
A  passionate  conviction.' 

Slavery  was  wrong  and  he  would  not  tolerate  it. 
Slave-masters,  brimming  with  slavery,  were 
imperious  and  lawless.  From  him  they  learned 
to  see  themselves  as  others  saw  them.  Strong 

o 

in  his  cause  and  in  the  consciousness  of  power, 
he  did  not  shrink  from  any  encounter,  and,  when 
it  was  joined,  he  used  not  only  argument  and 
history,  but  all  those  other  weapons  by  which 
a  bad  cause  is  exposed  to  scorn  and  contempt. 
Nobody  said  more  in  fewer  words,  or  gave  to 
language  a  sharper  bite.  Speech  was  with  him 


204  APPENDIX. 

at  times  a  cat-o'-nine-tails,  and  woe  to  the 
victim  on  whom  the  terrible  lash  descended. 

"Does  any  one  doubt  the  justifiableness  of 
such  debate?  Sarcasm,  satire,  and  ridicule  are 
not  given  in  vain.  They  have  an  office  to 
perform  in  the  economies  of  life.  They  ere 
faculties  to  be  employed  prudently  in  support 
of  truth  and  justice.  A  good  cause  is  helped 
if  its  enemies  are  driven  back ;  and  it  cannot  be 
doubted  that  the  supporters  of  wrong  and  the 
procrastinators  shrank  often  before  the  weapons 
he  wielded.  Soft  words  turn  away  wrath  ;  but 
there  is  a  time  for  strong  words  as  for  soft 
words.  Did  not  the  Saviour  seize  the  thongs 
with  which  to  drive  the  money-changers  from 
the  temple?  Our  money-changers  long  ago 
planted  themselves  within  our  temple.  Was  it 
not  right  to  lash  them  away  ?  Such  an  exercise 
of  power  in  a  generous  cause  must  not  be  con 
founded  with  that  personality  of  debate  which 
has  its  origin  in  nothing  higher  than  irritability, 
jealousy,  or  spite.  In  this  sense,  Thaddeus 
Stevens  was  never  personal.  No  personal 
thought  or  motive  controlled  him.  What  he 
said  was  for  his  country  and  mankind. 

"As  the  rebellion  assumed  its  gigantic  pro 
portions,  he  saw  clearly  that  it  could  be  smitten 
only  through  slavery  ;  and,  when  after  a  bloody 


APPENDIX.  205 

struggle  it  was  too  tardily  vanquished,  he  saw 
dearly  that  there  could  be  no  true  peace  except 
by  founding  the  new  government  on  the  equal 
rights  of  all.  And  this  policy  he  urged  with  a 
lofty  dogmatism  which  was  as  beneficent  as 
uncompromising.  The  rebels  burned  his  prop 
erty  in  Pennsylvania,  and  there  were  weaklings 
who  attributed  his  conduct  to  the  smart  at  his 
loss.  How  little  they  understood  his  nature  ! 
Injury  provokes  and  sometimes  excuses  resent 
ment.  But  it  was  not  in  him  to  allow  a  private 
grief  to  influence  his  public  conduct.  The 
losses  of  the  iron-master  were  forgotten  in  the 
duties  of  the  statesman.  He  asked  nothing  for 
himself.  He  did  not  ask  his  own  rights  except 
as  the  rights  of  man. 

"  I  know  not  if  he  could  be  called  an  orator, 
perhaps,  like  Fox,  he  were  better  called  a  de 
bater.  And  yet  I  doubt  if  words  were  ever 
delivered  with  more  effect  than  when,  broken 
with  years  and  decay,  he  stood  before  the  Sen 
ate,  and  in  the  name  of  the  House  of  Represen 
tatives,  and  of  all  the  people  of  the  United 
States,  impeached  Andrew  Johnson,  President 
of  the  United  States,  of  high  crimes  and  misde 
meanors  in  office.  Who  can  forget  his  steady, 
solemn  utterance  of  this  great  arraignment? 
The  words  were  few,  but  they  will  sound 


206  APPENDIX. 

through  the  ages.  The  personal  triumph  in 
his  position  at  that  moment  was  merged  in  the 
historic  grandeur  of  the  occasion.  For  a  long 
time,  against  opposition  of  all  kinds,  against 
misconceptions  of  the  law  and  against  apologies 
for  transactions  without  apology,  he  had  insisted 
on  impeachment ;  and  now  this  old  man,  totter 
ing  to  your  door,  dragged  the  Chief  Magistrate 
of  the  Republic  to  judgment.  It  was  he  who 
did  this  thing ;  and  I  should  do  poor  justice  to 
his  life  if  on  this  occasion  I  failed  to  express  my 
gratitude  for  the  heroic  deed.  His  merit  is 
none  the  less  because  other  influences  prevailed 
in  the  end.  His  example  will  remain  forever. 
"In  the  House,  which  wras  the  scene  of  his 
triumphs,  I  never  heard  him  but  once :  but  I 
cannot  forget  the  noble  eloquence  of  that  brief 
speech.  I  was  there  by  accident  just  as  he 
rose.  He  did  not  speak  more  than  ten  min 
utes  ;  but  every  sentence  seemed  an  oration. 
With  unhesitating  plainness  he  arraigned  Penn 
sylvania  for  her  denial  of  equal  rights  to  an 
oppressed  race,  and  rising  with  the  theme, 
declared  that  this  State  had  not  a  Republican 
government.  His  explicitness  was  the  more 
striking  because  he  was  the  Representative  of 
Pennsylvania.  I  presume  the  speech  will  be 
found  in  the  Globe.  Nobody,  who  has  con- 


APPENDIX.  207 

sidered  with  any  care  what  constitutes  a  Kepub- 
lican  government,  especially  since  the  definition 
supplied  by  our  Declaration  of  Independence, 
can  doubt  that  he  was  right.  His  words  will 
live  as  the  courageous  testimony  of  a  great 
character  on  this  important  question. 

"  The  last  object  of  his  life  was  the  establish 
ment  of  equal  rights  throughout  the  whole 
country  by  the  recognition  of  the  requirement 
of  the  Declaration  of  Independence.  I  have 
before  me  two  letters  in  which  he  records  his 
convictions,  which  are,  perhaps,  more  weighty, 
because  the  result  of  most  careful  consideration, 
when  age  had  furnished  experience  and  tem 
pered  the  judgment. 

"'I  have,'  says  he,  'long,  and  with  such 
ability  as  I  could  command  reflected  upon  the 
subject  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  and 
finally  have  come  to  the  sincere  conclusion  that 
universal  suffrage  was  one  of  the  inalienable 
rights  intended  to  be  embraced  in  that  instru 
ment.'  It  is  difficult  to  see  how  there  can  be 
any  hesitation  on  this  point,  when  the  great 
title-deed  expressly  says  that  governments  de 
rive  their  just  powers  from  the  consent  of  the 
governed.  But  this  is  not  the  only  instance  in 
which  he  was  constrained  by  the  habits  of  that 
profession,  which  he  practised  so  successfully. 


208  APPENDIX. 

A  great  Parliamentarian  of  France  has  said : 
f  The  more  one  is  a  lawyer  the  less  he  is  a 
Senator.'  Plus  on  est  avocat  moins  on  est 
tSenateur.  If  Stevens  reached  his  conclusion 
slowly,  it  was  because  he  had  not  completely 
emancipated  himself  from  that  technical  reason 
ing  which  is  the  boast  of  the  lawyer  rather  than 
of  the  statesman.  The  pretension  that  the 
power  to  determine  the  'qualifications '  of  voters, 
embraced  the  power  to  exclude  for  color,  and  that 
this  same  power  to  exclude  for  color  was  in 
cluded  in  the  asserted  power  of  the  States  to 
make  'regulations'  for  the  elective  franchise, 
seems  at  first  to  have  deceived  him  ;  as  if  it  was 
not  insulting  to  the  reason,  and  shocking  to  the 
moral  sense,  to  suppose  that  any  unalterable 
physical  condition,  such  as  color  of  hair,  eyes, 
or  skin,  could  be  a  f  qualification,'  and,  as  if  it 
was  not  equally  offensive  to  suppose,  that  under 
a  power  to  determine  '  qualifications  '  or  to 
make  '  regulations,'  a  race  could  be  disfran 
chised.  Of  course,  this  whole  pretension  is  a 
technicality  set  up  against  human  rights.  Noth 
ing  can  be  plainer  than  that  a  technicality  may 
be  employed  in  favor  of  human  rights,  but  never 
against  them.  Stevens  came  to  his  conclusion 
at  last,  and  rested  in  it  firmly.  It  was  his  final 
aspiration  to  see  it  prevail.  He  had  seen  much 


APPENDIX.  209 

for  which  he  had  striven,  embodied  in  the  in 
stitutions  of  his  country.  He  had  seen  slavery 
abolished.  He  had  seen  the  freedman  lifted  to 
equality  of  political  rights,  by  act  of  Congress  ; 
he  had  seen  the  colored  race  throughout  the 
whole  land  lifted  to  equality  of  civil  rights,  by 
act  of  Congress.  It  only  remained  that  he 
should  see  them  throughout  the  whole  land 
lifted  to  the  same  equality  in  political  rights ; 
and  then  the  promises  of  the  Declaration  of 
Independence  would  be  all  fulfilled.  But  he 
was  called  away  before  this  final  triumph.  A 
great  writer  of  antiquity,  a  perpetual  authority, 
tells  us,  that,  '  the  chief  duty  of  friends  is  not 
to  honor  the  departed  by  idle  grief,  but  to  re 
member  their  purposes,  and  to  carry  out  their 
mandates.'  These  are  the  words  of  Tacitus. 
I  venture  to  add  that  we  shall  best  honor  him 
whom  we  now  celebrate,  if  we  adopt  his  aspira 
tion,  and  strive  for  its  fulfilment. 

"  It  is  as  a  defender  of  human  rights,  that 
Thaddeus  Stevens  deserves  our  homage.  Here 
he  is  supreme.  On  other  questions  he  erred. 
On  the  finances  his  errors  were  signal.  But 
history  will  forget  these  and  other  failings,  as  it 
bends  with  reverence  before  those  exalted  labors 
by  which  humanity  has  been  advanced.  Already 
he  takes  his  place  among  illustrious  names, 


210  APPENDIX. 

which  are  the  common  property  of  mankind.  I 
see  him  now,  as  I  have  so  often  seen  him  during 
life.  His  venerable  form  moves  slowly  and 
with  uncertain  steps  ;  but  the  gathered  strength 
of  years  is  in  his  countenance,  and  the  light  of 
victory  on  his  path.  Politician,  calculator,  time- 
server,  stand  aside  !  A  hero-statesman  passes 
to  his  reward." 


Boston  Stereotype  Foundry,  No.  4  Pearl  Street. 


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FIRST  LESSONS  IN  THE  ARTICLES  OF  OUR  FAITH, 

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FOLSOM.  Disease  of  the  Mind.  Notes  on  the  Early  Management, 
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FOLSOM.    The  Four  Gospels,  from  the  Text  of  Tischendorf. 

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KING.  The  War-Ships  and  Navies  of  the  World.  Containing  a 
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MALLOCK.     Every  Man  His   Own  Poet;  or,  The  Inspired 

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PARKER.  The  Battle  of  Mobile  Bay  and  the  Capture  of 
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ROLLO'S  JOURNEY  TO  CAMBRIDGE.  A  Tale  of  the 
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WHITEFIELD.     The   Homes  of  our  Forefathers.     Being  a 

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WHITNEY— CLARKE.  A  Compendium  of  the  most  im 
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WINES.    The  State  of  Prisons  and  of  Child-Saving  Institu 
tions  in  the  Civilized  World.    By  E.  C.  WINES,  D.D.,  LL.D.    i  vol.    Large 
Svo.     719  pages.     $5.00. 
*#*  A  vast  repository  of  facts,  and  the  most  extensive  work  issued  in  any  language, 

on  matters  relating  to  prison  discipline  and  penal  justice. 

WORCESTER.      History  of  Hollis,   New  Hampshire.      By 

S.T.WORCESTER.     Maps  and  engravings.     Svo.     394  pages.     $2.50. 

For  sale  by  all  booksellers,  or  mailed,  postage  paid,  on  receipt  of  price. 

A.   WILLIAMS  &   COMPANY, 

PUBLISHERS,   BOSTON. 


Messrs.  A.  WILLIAMS  &  CO.'S 

LATEST  PUBLICATIONS. 

Troublesome  Children :  Their  Ups  and  Downs. 

By  ONE  OF  THEM.  With  ten  full-page  colored  illustrations, 
and  fifteen  plain  engravings  by  Francis  G.  Attwood.  i  vol. 
Thick  oblong  quarto.  Exquisitely  colored  covers.  Price,  $2.50. 

***  Being  wholly  without  cant,  affectation,  or  any  attempt  to  enter  into  the  subtle 
ties  ol  religious  creeds;  the  purity,  sweetness,  and  combined  tenderness  and  humor, 
together  with  its  high  moral  tone,  will  give  it,  too,  an  entrance  into  the  home  of  our 
American  firesides  in  a  way  suggestive  of  the  welcome  accorded  to  the  "Frai.conia" 
stories  and  "Alice's  Adventures  in  Wonderland." 

Sly  Ballades  in  Harvard  China. 

By  E.  S.  M.  With  many  illustrations  and  in  folded  paper 
covers  exquisitely  designed  and  colored  by  Lambert  Hollis,  after 
the  manner  of  the  famous  Paris  "Amateur"  Series.  i  vol. 
Small  quarto.  $1.00. 

%*  The  most  dainty  collection  of  charming  fancies  since  Praed,  and  worthy  of  the 
school  which  has  produced  such  inimitable  jeu  d'esprit  as  "  The  Little  Tin  Gods  on 
Wheels  "  and  "  Rollo's  Tour  to  Cambridge." 

Thaddeus  Stevens:  Commoner. 

By  E.  B.  CALLENDER,  member  of  the  Massachusetts  Bar.  One 
volume,  with  portrait,  handsomely  bound  in  cloth,  $1.25. 

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LONGFELLOW  AND  EMERSON. 

The  Massachusetts  Historical  Society's  Memorial  Volume. 

Containing  the  addresses  and  eulogies  by  Dr.  G.  E.  Ellis,  Dr. 
Oliver  Wendell  Holmes,  Charles  E.  Norton  and  others,  together 
with  Mr.  Emerson's  tribute  to  Thomas  Carlyle  and  his  earlier 
and  much-sought-for  addresses  on  Sir  Walter  Scott  and  Robert 
Burns.  Illustrated  with  two  full-page  portraits  in  albertype  after 
Mr.  Notman's  faithful  and  pleasing  photographs  of  Mr.  Long 
fellow,  and  Mr.  Havves's  celebrated  photograph  of  Mr.  Emerson, 
taken  in  1855,  so  highly  prized  by  collectors.  One  volume. 
Quarto.  Boards.  Uncut.  Price,  $2.50;  or  in  white  vellum, 
cloth,  gilt  top,  uncut  edges,  $3.50.  Limited  edition  printed. 

The  Sewall  Papers. 

Diary  of  Samuel  Sewall,  1674-1729.  Edited  by  GEO.  E.  ELLIS, 
D.D.  3  vols.  Large  Svo.  With  elaborate  index.  $9.00  net. 

***  A  literal  transcript,  in  type,  of  the  famous  diary  of  Chief  Justice  Sewall,  of 
Massachusetts,  in  possession  of  the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society.  As  a  minute 
picture  of  the  manners  and  customs  of  early  colonial  days,  abounding  in  wit,  humor, 
and  wisdom  in  the  quaintest  of  English,  it  has  no  prototype.  The  importance  of  its 
publication  as  a  discovery  can  be  compared  only  with  the  deciphering  of  the  diary  of 
Samuel  Pepys,  which  it  fully  equals  in  interest. 


10  Publications  of  A.  Williams  $  Co.,  Boston. 

A  Bed  Letter  Day. 

Poems  by  Lucius  HARWOOD  FOOTE.  Handsome  cover  in 
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paper.  Elegant  print.  Square  I2ino.  112  pages.  Cloth.  $1.56. 

The  Sheep  Scab. 

Its  nature,  prevention,  and  cure.  A  handbook  for  American 
Shepherds.  By  HENRY  TEMPLE  BROWN.  To  which  is  added  bv 
request:  "The  Classification  of  Wools  and  their  Marketable 
Values,"  an  address  delivered  before  the  Missouri  State  Wool 
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A  New  Volume  of  Proverbs. 

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Walking  Guide  to  the  Mt.  Washington  Range, 

By  WILLIAM  H.  PICKERING.  With  large  map.  Square  i6mo. 
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What  Our  Mothers  Make. 

A  Pamphlet  volume  of  Tried  Receipts  first  issued  for  the 
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Cape  Cod  Folks. 

A  novel.  By  SALLY  PRATT  McLEAN.  With  frontispiece  by 
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I  vol.  i2mo.  327  pages.  $1.50.  Eleventh  edition. 

"  There  is  real  power  in  her  characterization.  Real  eloquence  in  her  account  of 
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the  intense  religious  sentiment  of  these  simple  brave  people." — Boston  Advertiser. 

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Love  Poems  and  Sonntts. 

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"  It  is  a  lovely  volume  of  lovely  verses  on  the  loveliest  of  themes." — W.  R.  Alger. 

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contempt  from  the  admirers  of  Whitman  and  Wilde,  for  with  all  its  strength  and  pas 
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"  A  sense  of  power  still  held  in  reserve  fascinates  the  reader,  and  through  all  its 
changing  forms  the  fervent  passion  obeys  the  master's  hand." — Literary  World. 

"  The  contents  are  sweet,  passionate,  and  plaintive." — N.  Y.  Times. 

Driven  to  Sea;  or,  The  Adventures  of  Norrie  Seton. 

By  Mrs.  GEORGE  CUPPLES.  Illustrated.  Cloth.  Full  gilt 
sides.  Large  I2mo.  $1.50.  ^^**Eleventh  thousand. 


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The  Deserted  Ship ;  a  Story  of  the  Atlantic. 

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"  In  these  two  absorbing  sea  stories—"  The  Deserted  Ship,"  and  "  Driven  to 
Sea" — the  peril  and  adventure  of  a  sailor's  life  are  graphically  described,  its  ameni 
ties  and  allurements  being  skillfully  offset  by  pictures  of  its  hardships  and  exposures, 
and  the  virtues  of  endurance,  fortitude,  fidelity,  and  courage  are  portrayed  with 
rough  and  ready,  and  highly  attractive  effusiveness." — Harper's  Magazine. 

Fly  Fishing  in  Maine  Lakes ;  or,  Camp  Life  in  the  Wilderness. 

By  Maj.  CHARLES  W.  STEVENS,  Commander  of  the  Ancient 
and  Honorable  Artillery  Company,  Boston.  With  colored 
frontispiece  of  the  best  killing  flies,  and  rubricated  title-page. 
Square  I2mo.  Cloth.  201  pages.  $1.25. 

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"  The  book  is  really  very  liv  ly." — Cincinnati  Commercial. 

Sollo's  Journey  to  Cambridge. 

Illustrations  and  illuminated  cover  by  FRANCIS  G.  ATTWOOD. 
i  vol.  Quarto.  50  cents. 

%*  A  satire  upon  Life  at  Harvard  College  in  the  form  of  a  parody  upon  the 
famous  Rollo  Story  Books.  Printed  originally  in  the  Harvard  Lampoon,  and  later 
compiled  with  the  consent  of  the  editors  into  a  sqaure  octavo  in  ^c»per  covers.  The 
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most  decided  hit.  Already  four  editions  have  been  exhausted,  and  the  demand 
promises  to  continue  as  long  as  Harvard  College  maintains  its  influence  on  surround 
ing  social  life,  and  humor  continues  to  bean  American  characteristic. 

Bicycle  Tour  in  England  and  Wales. 

By  CAPT.  SHARPE  and  A.  D.  CHANDLER,  President  of  the 
Boston  Bicycle  Club.  Illustrated  by  four  large  folding  maps 
and  seventeen  brightly  finished  albertype  engravings.  Small 
quarto.  Gilt.  164  pages.  $2.00. 

***  The  title  gives  not  the  slightest  idea  of  the  real  contents.  It  is  a  work  of 
exquisite  beauty,  displaying  rare  taste  and  judgment,  laboriously  and  elaborately 
executed,  which  none  but  an  intense  devotee  of  the  wheel  could  have  carried  out  to- 
such  an  interesting  degree. 

Southern  Rambles :  Florida. 

By  OWEN  KNOX.  Very  profusely  illustrated.  150  pages. 
Square  I2ino.  Cloth,  $1.00;  paper,  50  cents. 

***  An  amusing  and  satirical  account  of  a  Winter's  Trip  to  Florida,  filled  with 
laughable  incidents,  character  studies,  descriptions  of  Southern  Life,  wholly  devoid  of 
exaggeration,  showing  Florida  as  it  struck  the  author,  and  not  as  the  interested  guide 
book-makers  endeavor  to  prove  it  to  be. 

Poetical  and  Prose  Writings  of  Charles  Sprague. 

New  edition,  with  a  steel  portrait  and  a  biographical  sketch, 
I2mo.  Cloth.  207  pages.  $1.50. 

New  England  Interiors. 

BY  ARTHUR  LITTLE.  A  volume  of  sketches  in  eld  New  Eng 
land  places.  Thick  oblong  quarto.  $5.00. 

*»*  *'  To  those  far  distant,  unfamiliar  with  the  nooks  and  corners  of  New  England, 
and  prone  to  consider  the  work  of  Puritanical  colonists  noticeable  only  for  its  lack  of 
taste,  and  conspicuous  for  green  blinds  and  white  painted  walls,  this  work  will  be  a 
revelation." — Boston  Daily  Advertiser. 

The  Land  of  Gold. 

By  GEORGE  H.  SPURR.  A  novel  founded  upon  fact.  Illustra 
tive^  of  pioneer  life  in  California  in  '49.  I2mo.  Cloth.  270 
pages.  Illustrated.  $1.50. 


12  Publications  of  A.  Williams  $  Co.,  Boston. 

The  Homes  of  our  Forefathers. 

A  selection  of  the  Oldest  and  most  Interesting  Buildings 
Historical  Houses,  and  Noted  places  in  Massachusetts.  By 
EDWIN  WHITEFIELD.  Quarto.  Cloth.  $6.00. 

***  Third  improved  and  enlarged  edition  of  this  valuable  and  interesting  work 
which  is  composed  entirely  of  plates,  in  color,  accompanied  with  descriptions. 

The  Homes  of  Our  Forefathers.  2nd  Part. 

Same  as  above,  but  embracing  the  Historical  Homes  of  Rhode 
Island  and  Connecticut.  By  EDWIN  WHITEFIELD.  4to.  Cloth. 
$6.00. 

Dr.  HowelTs  Family,       Christine's  Fortune. 

By  Mrs.  H.  B.  GOODWIN.  New  and  popular  editions  in  a  very 
attractive  style  of  binding.  Each  i6mo.  Cloth.  $1.00. 

"Of  the  merits  of  them,  it  is  difficult  to  speak  too  highly.  They  are  written  in  a 
style  as  near  perfection  as  it  is  possible  to  conceive.  Better  books  a  parent  cannot  put 
into  the  hands  of  a  son  or  daughter. " — Watchman. 

Captain  Nathan  Hale. 

An  address  delivered  at  Groton,  Connecticut,  on  the  Hale 
Memorial  Day,  September  7,  1881.  By  EDWARD  EVERETT 
HALE.  Pamphlet.  20  cents. 

Feirce's  Colonial  Lists. 

Civil,  Military,  and  Professional  Lists  of  Plymouth  and  Rhode 
Island  Colonies,  comprising  Colonial,  County,  and  Town  Officers, 
Clergymen,  Physicians,  and  Lawyers.  With  extracts  from 
Colonial  Laws  defining  their  duties.  1620 — 1700.  By  EBEN- 
EZER  W.  PEIRCE,  of  Freetown,  Mass.,  member  of  various  His 
torical  and  Genealogical  Societies.  1881.  Svo.  156  pages.  Price, 
$2.00. 

Henry  Knos  Thatcher,  Hear  Admiral  U.  S,  Navy, 

By  GEORGE  HENRY  PREBLE,  U.  S.  N.  A  pamphlet  biography 
of  the  late  Admiral  Thatcher.  With  steel  portrait.  Price  50 
cents. 

Tower.    Modern  American  Bridge  Building. 

Illustrated.     I  vol.     Svo.     Cloth.     $1.00. 
***  The  only  work  on  modern  wooden  bridges. 

Poems  of  the  Pilgrims, 

Selected  by  ZILPHA  H.  SPOONER.  A  handsome  I2mo.  bound 
in  cloth.  Bevelled  edges.  Heavy  paper.  Gilt  edges.  Illustrated 
in  photography.  The  poems,  about  thirty  in  number,  are  se 
lected  from  Lowell,  Holmes,  Bryant,  Mrs.  Sigourney,  Mrs. 
Hemans,  and  other  great  writers.  Price  $2.00. 

James  A.  Garfield.    Tributes  from  Over  the  Sea. 

Being  selections  from  Foreign  Testimonials  to  the  late  Presi 
dent  Garfield.  Sm.  410.  50  cents. 

The  Labor  Question. 

The  relation  of  political  economy  to  the  labor  question.  By 
CARROLL  D.  WRIGHT,  Chief  of  the  Mass.  Bureau  of  Statistics 
of  Labor.  I  vol.  Thin  i6mo.  Cloth.  60  cents. 

***  "  Col.  Wright  has  discussed  the  theme  in  a  striking  and  original  manner,  and 
deserves  the  thanks  of  the  community." — Boston  Traveler, 


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